


Sonnet 87

by tiabeanny



Category: Sally Face (Video Games)
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-20
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2020-07-09 14:49:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 25,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19889614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiabeanny/pseuds/tiabeanny
Summary: Leaving Nockfell in the rear view meant giving up the only home she'd ever known, and the people she'd loved, something some people could never forgive her for. But when her father passes, Ash returns to pick up the pieces of her family, uncovering memories and feelings she'd thought she'd left behind.





	1. Chapter 1

**One**

_“You promised.”_

_His voice was hoarse from yelling. She wouldn't look at him._

_“I can’t stay here forever.” Her mouth shaped the words, but no sound came out. She tried again, but they stayed frozen in her throat. She wanted him to understand. “I need more than Nockfell. I'm sorry.”_

_Still silence._

_“If you go… You can't come back.” She tried to raise her eyes to him, but just as she did, his familiar face shifted, darkening into something shadowy and shapeless. He towered over her, long clawed tendrils drifting out where his arms should have been._

_“You can never come back.” His - Its- voice distorted, unrecognizable. The monster, no longer him, reached out to touch her. A gnarled black hand wrapped around her throat. It tightened. She could feel it crushing her windpipe, leaving her gasping, fingernails scraping at flesh that dissolved under them._

_Sinking. Suffocating._

_“I'm sorry.”_

The train hit a hard turn and Ash’s temple slammed against the window, jolting her awake. The sunlight coming in through the grimy glass and the pain behind her eyes left her feeling disoriented, momentarily unsure of where she was, or where she was going. 

She ran through the checklist in her head. 

_I'm on a train from Manhattan to Nockfell.  
It’s a six hour trip. _

She glanced at her watch, hanging loosely on her wrist. 

_I have three and a half hours to go._  
Dad is dead.  
I am going home for the funeral. 

Her heartbeat started to slow, but the image of the dream lingered. She wished she could say it was something new. 

In truth, the same dream had plagued her for nearly six months just after she left for college, when the wound was still fresh. Over the last six years, it had essential died off, only rearing its ugly head when she heard one of his favorite songs, or caught a glimpse of coffee colored hair on the street. It shouldn't have surprised her that the trip home would bring it back to the surface. 

Ash began to regret insisting that she make the trip alone. Jesse had checked with her again that morning, covers still pulled up under his chin, while she finished packing her suitcase. 

“Are you sure you want to go alone, babe?” His voice had been thick with sleep, and he yawned. She ignored the sharp remark that skipped to edge of her tongue. 

“I don't know how long I’ll be gone.” She didn't pause to look at him, busy shoving balls of socks and underwear into any space left in the compartment, and kept her tone level. “We have a lot to go through. It could be weeks.” 

“Should I come for the funeral then? I hate to think of you being there alone.” Ash frowned, pulled her lower lip between her teeth. She hated when he did this, offered something he would never willingly give, just so he could feel good about himself. She convinced herself it was well intentioned. Maybe if she changed her mind, he wouldn't hesitate to get on the train with her. Did she even want him to?

“I won't be alone.” With some difficulty, she managed to zip the suitcase and heave it off the dresser onto the floor. She had over packed. Again. “Ben will be there as soon as I get off the train. And I’ll have my mom, of course. And I'm sure Chug and Maple, and Sal.”

In the mirror, she saw something sour cross flicker across his face at the mention of her friends. He caught get gaze in the reflection and smiled warmly. It didn't reach his eyes. 

“Well,” he said finally, pushing himself up to lean against the headboard, “as long as you'll be alright. I hate the thought of you going through this without me.” 

He’d insisted on driving her to the station, and, feeling guilty, she’d agreed. He’d promised her it wouldn't matter if he was a few minutes late for work, she was more important, but by the time they'd parked, she’d caught him checking his watch twice. She'd been right - He would've never survived taking the time off. 

He didn't wait for her to get inside before peeling out of the lot. 

Still, maybe she’d been naive in insisting she’d been handling things rather well that morning. Now that she was alone, she began to wish for any kind of company. Even Jesse’s.

It wasn’t even the idea of burying her father that distressed her the most. Since his diagnosis two years ago, they’d been living on borrowed time. In a way, she was relieved that he was somewhere better, and there was no more waiting for the worst. 

No, what really bothered her was that since her brother had called, backed by the symphony of the hospital, the only person Ash wanted to be with was Larry. The owner of the angry voice in her nightmare. The one person she couldn't reach out to, no matter how badly she ached for him. 

Ash sighed, and reached under the seat to fish the laptop out of her duffel bag. Her boss had been overly kind about her taking off work, told her not to push herself and to take her time understanding her grief. She’d even given Ash the name of a therapist she knew, and recommended an esthetician for when she came back. 

“All those tears do something dreadful to the skin, darling.” 

Still, work was all she had, so she flipped open the computer and let her head rest against the scratched blue pleather while it hummed to life. The collection of faces smiling back at her from the desktop made her feel better almost immediately, and she felt herself release a tension between her shoulders she hadn't known she was holding there. 

It was a picture from the holiday break before graduation, on her 18th birthday. She was standing in the center, flanked on one side by Maple, who was kissing her cheek, and on the other by Sal. His expression was indiscriminate behind his prosthetic, but she remembered the sound of his laughter as clearly as if he were next to her now. Chug had his arms around both of the girls shoulders, and Todd was on the other side of Maple, glossy eyed and clearly drunk. 

There was an arm around Sal’s shoulders too, tan and slender, but it was bodiless. It was too hard for her to see his face after everything that had happened, so she’d cropped most of him out. Now only that arm haunted her, the same way the rest of him did in her dreams. 

For once in her life, Ash was grateful for the stream of irate emails and problem causing clients to deal with. The rest of the ride passed as quickly as a train ride can. Somewhere a little less than an hour away, the stops became more frequent, and the combination of reading and restarting caused a migraine to bloom at the base of her temple, so she tucked the computer away again and sat in silence the rest of the way. 

They had gone through the last city, and she watched through the layer of film as the houses and buildings melted away into the familiar expanse of nothingness that surrounded Nockfell. Her chest tightened when the train started to slow again, pulling into the train station where she and Sal used to bounce rocks off the tracks and wait for anyone new who would stumble into town. 

She pulled her luggage from under the seats and made her way through the compartments to the door. She was the only one left on the train, she realized. Not that that was unusual. Most people never came to Nockfell, and the ones that did hardly ever left. That was why it had been so important for her to make her escape when she could. 

So she wouldn't end up in the soil next to the Phelps ministry, where the Earth was unnaturally soft and somehow alive. Where her father would be. 

The attendant at the door helped her get her bags onto the platform, and for a moment she thought about jumping back on. She could go another town over. Or two, or three, and go back to New York tomorrow. She could tell Ben it was just too hard, or work wouldn't let her take time off. Or maybe nothing at all. She could disappear into the wind and no one would ever know she’d been back. 

But she waited too long, and the train pulled away, leaving her alone in kicked up dust. 

There was an unfamiliar pick up in the lot across the tracks, but she was the only one there, and it wouldn't have been unusual for Ben to trade in their father’s old Honda for something newer in the time that’d passed since she'd been home. She approached and tapped on the passenger window. She hadn't realized how much she missed her brother until she was here, a few feet away from him. It would be therapeutic to hug him, to finally allow herself to cry, to remember what it was to be home. 

Tears were already threatening to fall when the window rolled down, and the breath caught in her throat. It wasn’t Ben’s soft green eyes looking back at her. They were brown ones, warm and sweet like molasses cookies. His mouth was drawn thin, and although he looked at her, he wouldn't meet her gaze. Larry leaned over and pushed the door open, Ash jumping out of the way to avoid being hit. The hand still gripping the wheel was white knuckled, and she could feel her heart sink low in her chest. 

“Get in.”


	2. Two

She should have gotten back on the train. 

Better yet, she should have refused to come at all. She hated funerals, anyways. She could have made some excuse about needing to mourn on her own, wanting space to breathe. Then she could be home, in bed with Jesse, or at work, or the Farmers Market, or anywhere else except in the parking lot of Nockfell’s train station, pushing her luggage into the bed of Larry’s truck. He hadn’t offered to help her with her bags, but then she hadn’t expected him to. 

It was hard to say what she had been expecting, but Larry would have been on the very bottom of her list. The only thing lower would have been her father picking her up himself, a decaying corpse in the driver's seat. And that may have been preferable to the cold silence that was waiting for her once she sidled into the passenger seat, hands folded and eyes trained out the front window. 

The trip into town had been hard, the fifteen minute drive from the station to her house would be unbearable. She ached for music, for chatter, even for him to explode in the seat next to her and yell until her ears bled. Anything would have been better than the way he was pretending she didn’t exist, like she was nobody and nothing at all. 

She opened her mouth once, intending to ask why Ben hadn’t been the one to pick her up, like they’d discussed, but she shut it again without speaking. She tried to focus on the landscape instead, to occupy herself with how Nockfell had changed since the last time she’d set foot there, which felt like eons ago. 

As it turned out, it had barely changed at all. It held all the same hills and valleys, the long stretches of plain, the same heavy air of bondage. They passed the high school, the lawn mildly unkempt because of summer break, and a tightness bloomed in her chest. All the good memories she had there, and even the not so good ones, had a cloud over them now. They were tainted by what had happened, by the person she had become. She shifted in her seat, and she wondered if Larry felt the tension rise, because he finally leaned over and turned on the radio. The tune was unfamiliar, but she was happy to settle back into the seat and let it wash over her until the car finally rounded the corner of Ash’s street and pulled into her driveway. 

She hesitated, her fingers ghosting over the door handle. She had hated that he refused to look at her, but now she was the one who couldn’t look at him. She should thank him, because it was the polite thing to do, but she was afraid that if she opened her mouth, too much would spill out before she could stop it. She allowed herself to glance in his direction, and caught his eyes on her. Nockfell had stayed the same, but Larry hadn’t. His face had sharpened, all edges and angles. The bags under his eyes, always deep-set, had worsened, and he had a few days worth of outgrowth framing his mouth. His hair was still long, pulled up into a haphazard bun on the top of his head, but it had lost all its luster. She could remember his voice cracking when she’d told him about school. 

“If you leave, I won’t have anything left here.” 

Maybe that had been true. 

Larry cleared his throat and looked away, and Ash was pulled out of her reverie. She got out of the car and shut the door behind her in silence, too thrown by how much he had aged to spit out the gratitude she owed him. There was yelling from the house, and the crashing of plates, as she pulled her luggage from the bed and started to wheel it up the drive. She was almost at the doorway when she heard his voice from behind her. 

“Ash.” She turned, too quickly, too eagerly. He was leaning out the window with his arm on the door, his face still tight. She thought his mouth had relaxed just a little, but she couldn’t be sure. “Welcome back.” 

\--   
The Campbell house had been a wreck when she arrived. As it turned out, their mother had been in complete shutdown mode, leaving Ben to try to maintain everything. Betty had gone upstairs to rest her eyes, and the Campbell siblings stopped scraping mold off dishes in the sink to have a cup of coffee and take a break from the natural disaster of their lives. Ash held the mug in both hands, a chill running through her that she hadn’t been able to shake since Larry pulled away. 

“I’m glad the train ride wasn’t too bad,” Ben said, shaking sugar into his cup. “Sorry I couldn’t be there to pick you up, she was just… Well, you saw.” Ash had intended to be angry with Ben when she came in, but the sight of her mother throwing plates on the tile had made her change her tune. “I tried calling Sal but he had something with his dad and Maple was at a doctor’s appointment. Larry was the only one left.” 

Ash rolled her eyes. “I could have taken an Uber.” 

“In Nockfell?” Ben snorted and took a swig from his mug. “You’re not in the city anymore, Ash. I think we have like, one Uber and it only operates on Saturday nights. And I’m pretty sure it’s Chug’s dad.” Ash sighed and rolled her shoulders in an effort to release some of the tension she was holding there. It didn’t help. 

“Was it really that bad? What did he say to you?” 

Ash looked at steam wafting off her coffee, counted the ripples in the cup. “Nothing.” 

“Come on, what did he say?”

“No, he really said nothing. He didn’t talk to me, or yell at me, or even look at me. It was like I was…” Her heart twisted. “A ghost.” Ben put his cup down softly on the table, and reached across to pat the back of her hand. 

“He can’t hate you forever, Ash.” It was funny to see Ben like this, so sensitive and understanding. It reminded her of when he was just a kid, and would pin crayon drawings on her door. Now that he was a man, lumberjack esque and a mechanic to boot, she sometimes forgot that if someone asked her, she would still say that her little brother was her best friend. She swallowed the lump in her throat. 

“He’s going to try.” 

“Well,” Ben exhaled through pursed lips. “Do you think he knows?” 

“Not unless you told him.” Ash’s tone was sharp, and he put up his hands in defense. 

“We don’t talk about you at work.” She didn’t seem convinced, so he added, “Seriously. Honestly, we barely even talk at all. Did you tell anyone else?”

“Only Maple. Mom doesn’t even know yet.” Ben lowered his eyes to her hands, still around the mug. 

“What about dad?” 

“I told him, but… He was so bad at the end. I don’t think he would’ve remembered long enough to tell him.” Ben shifted in his seat, and Ash did the same. They hadn’t talked about their father yet. They had an unspoken agreement to avoid it as long as possible. 

“Then he must not. It’s not like you’ve posted it anywhere. And you’re not wearing it.” Ash followed Ben’s gaze to her fingers, interlocked. “Why aren’t you, anyway?” He cocked an eyebrow at her. 

“I just don’t want all that attention right now. Not until after the funeral, anyway.” The lie felt like syrup in her mouth. 

Ben hesitated, and then shrugged. “I get that.” His face looked as though he wanted to say something else, and thought better of it. He leaned forward to touch the back of Ash’s hand again, her own soft mossy eyes looking back at her from his face. “Don’t wait too long to tell Mom though, okay? She needs something to look forward to.” 

As if on cue, Betty’s voice rang out from upstairs, and Ben pushed back from the table. “You get the next one,” he said, excusing himself and heading up the steps to tend to their mother, who was working through her grief like a bedridden Victorian child. Once she heard the door to the room shut upstairs, she pulled her purse from the chair she’d hung it on and dug to the bottom, feeling for the small velvet box she'd tucked inside that morning. 

She wrapped her fingers around it and lifted it out, carefully tipping the top back as if she were afraid it would detonate. In the kitchen light, the stone looked more like etched glass than diamond. It was too big, too gaudy. Nothing she would have picked out for herself. And maybe Jesse was like that too. 

Just all wrong.


	3. Three

By late afternoon, Ben and Ash had made their way into the study. It was thwarted by books and envelopes, any real furniture lost in the fray. 

“She won’t come in here.” Ben was saying, sitting behind the desk and shuffling through a stack of mail that looked as though it was from 1988. 

“I wouldn’t want to come in here, either.” Ash’s voice came from the closet, where she was surrounded by boxes upon boxes of paperwork. “It’s essentially a nightmare.” One of the smaller boxes up on the shelf took a nosedive, and she narrowly avoided being hit in the head. It clattered to the floor and opened, newspaper clippings scattering around her like fresh snow. She cursed under her breath and knelt to collect them. 

She picked up one of the bigger clippings first, one with a color photograph on it of a boys soccer team. Time had made the printing less clear, and Ash had to hold it up to the yellow light to be able to make out the faces. “Why would dad have newspaper clippings of a soccer team? Did you play soccer?” She leaned her head out of the closet doorway to look at her brother, feeding old letters into the shredder. 

Ben shrugged. “Just pee-wee in like, fourth grade.” Ash looked at the clipping again. These boys were older, dressed in the Nockfell High uniform. Ben turned in the chair to look at her. “Is the caption still on it?” 

“I didn’t see one…” She turned the paper over in her hand. The back had been part of an article, but it was only a paragraph or so, and made no sense out of context. She looked at the photograph again, and then noticed a strip of text underneath that she had missed before, so small it was almost unreadable. Photograph by Ashley Campbell.

Ash felt a twist in her chest, and retreated back into the closet to look at the rest of the clippings surrounding her. They were all pictures, she realized. Some color, most black and white, some on newspaper and some printed on the computer paper the school had used for their newsletter. All of them had her name underneath them. Pictures of the trees on Lake Wendigo after the chill had stripped them of their leaves. A picture of Sal, playing his guitar on the front lawn of the school. Maple and Chug dancing at prom. One taken from the top of the ferris wheel at the county fair. She couldn’t remember taking most of them, or ever even telling her father that they’d been published somewhere. But they were all here, too fragile in her fingertips, a timeline of a life she had almost forgotten she’d lived. 

“Ash?” Ben’s voice from behind her made her jump. “Hey, what is it? You okay?” 

“Yeah,” Ash laughed, the damp in her eyes spilling over into her voice. Still, she held back her tears. “They’re mine.” She offered Ben one of the clippings, and he took it from her, confusion on his face. “It’s all the pictures I took in high school. From the Nockfell Newsletter, from The Post.” Ben’s face fell into a knowing sort of smile, his eyes glistening too. “I didn’t even know he knew about that stuff.” 

“Dad was funny like that.” Ben knelt beside her, cramped in the small space, and put an arm around her shoulders. She leaned into him, and for a few blissful minutes, the two of them sat and looked at the photographs around them in silence. Looking at it like this, Nockfell didn’t seem so bad. She wondered when she had stopped being able to see the beauty in this town, when it had become somewhere to run away from, instead of a home to escape to.

She could feel the steady drop of Ben’s tears falling onto the crown of her head, and she waited until they stopped to disentangle herself and scoop the pictures back into their box. Ben helped, and then they both stood and surveyed the mess that still awaited them, both in the closet and out. There was so much work to do, and she suddenly had so little energy to do it. 

Ben must have been feeling as burned out as she was, because he turned to her and said, “I think that’s enough for today. Why don’t we go get a drink?” 

Ash almost laughed, but the burn of alcohol seemed like a pain she would be foolish to pass on, so she agreed. He clapped her on the shoulder and moved around her to step into the hallway, disappearing again into Betty’s room, presumably to let her know they’d be stepping out. Ash lingered in the doorway of the study, her hands in the pockets of her jeans. She could almost see him, the shadow of her father, bent over the desk, a pencil dancing across that blue paper Ash had always wanted to draw on so badly. She remembered how Sal and Larry had talked to her about ghosts they’d seen, the way they plagued Addison Apartments, and she wished, not for the first time, that she could see them too. 

The Mill was unusually crowded, even for a Friday night. Being back in the bar transported Ash to her senior year, when she and Larry would brandish fake ID’s at the door and get drunk on blue hawaiians, because they were the only things they could stomach. It still smelled like cigarette smoke and stale sweat, and she was already beginning to regret coming while Ben pulled her towards the bar against the back wall. The music was too loud, and she had to practically climb on top of the counter for the bartender to hear her order. 

She and Ben settled into stools at the edge of the bar to wait for their drinks, and Ash tried to drink it all in. For the most part, much like the rest of the town, it was the same. The pool tables in the off-room looked newer, there was an electronic dartboard on one of the walls. No smoking signs were posted above the bars and next to the bathroom doors, but otherwise, it was identical to the version that lived in her head. She wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.

The bartender, a blue haired boy Ash had gone to high school with, (Philip maybe?) set their drinks down in front of them, and leaned forward to ask Ben if he wanted to open a tab. He did, and ordered a round of shots, just as Ash noticed a more familiar head of baby blue hair moving in their direction.  
Sal pushed his way through the crowd, and Ash pushed herself off the stool to wrap her arms around his neck. He hugged her back, just a little too tight, but perfectly Sal. She stayed close after he released her to talk into his ear. 

“How did you know I’d be here?” 

“Ben told us,” Sal said, just as loud, but she still had to cover her other ear to hear him. 

“Us?” For a moment, Ash’s heart sank. But it was Maple’s round face that popped up behind him, and Ash was so overcome she felt like she could cry. She stepped around Sal to embrace her, but was met with an obstacle that made her pause. Maple, seeing the shock in her face, turned sideways and gestured for her to come closer. 

“Hug me over the bump!” 

She did, pulling Maple as close as possible. She’d been lonely so long, she’d started to forget that there was another setting. The warmth in her chest was so foreign, that feeling of belonging and safety that she hadn’t even known she was missing. Philip brought over their shots, adding another for Sal and one of cranberry juice for Maple. He exchanged an awkward grin with Sal that the rest of them pretended to ignore, and sidled away to the other end of the bar. 

“Are you sure you should be here, Maple?” Ash asked, after they had all emptied their glasses, while Sal put a loving hand on Maple’s extended stomach. 

“It’s fine,” she said, waving a hand dismissively. “Besides, I’m always here on Friday nights. I never miss Larry playing a set.” Sal’s hand fell to his side, and Ben nearly lost the grip on his beer. Ash felt like she’d been hit hard in the chest, and inhaled audibly, desperate for breath. Maple looked between them, brow furrowed, and then understanding flashed across her face. “Shit. I’m sorry, I have total pregnancy brain.” 

The DJ lowered the music considerably, and above the heads of the crowd, Ash could just see them setting up for a band on the small platform. 

“It’s my fault,” Ben said, twisting the neck of the bottle between his fingers and looking like he could’ve kicked himself. “I forgot he plays here on Friday nights.” Sal wrapped a hand around Ash’s wrist gently. When she turned to look at him, she could see the worry in his eyes. 

“We can go somewhere else,” he said, too soft. Too coddling. Ash looked around at her brother and Maple, who both had that same look in their eyes, like someone surveying a child that taken a spill, and were afraid they might start crying. 

“No.” Ash turned, waved Philip back over to their side of the bar. “Besides, where would we go? There is one bar in Nockfell and this is it. It’s fine.” Maple and Sal relaxed a little, but Ben’s gaze never left her face, searching for something she refused to let him see. 

“I hope you’re right.” 

Ash turned to see Sal looking towards the platform, and she followed his line of sight to see Larry taking a step up onto it. People had pushed themselves as close to the platform as possible, but from her perch on the barstool, Ash had a better view. He had tied his hair up on top of his head into a loose bun, making the angles on his face look even sharper under the dim lighting. A leather jacket was pushed up to his elbows, and she could see the shapes of tattoos there she had never seen before. Her throat felt tight. 

There was a ripple of enthusiastic applause as Larry adjusted the microphone, and Maple leaned over to whisper in Ash’s ear. “He’s gotten pretty good. A lot of people come just to hear him.” 

On stage, even on this small one, Larry was a different person. He laughed into the microphone, greeted the crowd. He strummed a few notes, and Ash tried to ignore the memory of those fingers on her skin, but the alcohol was hitting her now, and Larry as a whole was getting harder to ignore. 

“Thank you. Thank you.” The applause died out. Ash gripped the glass in her hand as hard as she could. “It’s really nice to see some familiar faces out here tonight.” There was a mild uproar from the crowd, and Larry raised a bottle of beer he’d had on the stage to them before taking a long drag. “I’m gonna play something a little different tonight.” He paused, pulled on his guitar strap. “This is a song I wrote for someone a long time ago, and uh… We actually have the pleasure of having them in the audience with us tonight.” 

Sal, Maple, and Ben, turned to look at Ash at the same time. Heat swallowed her whole, turned her skin to fire. 

“She hasn’t heard this song before but, I hope she likes it.” Larry looked over the crowd and locked eyes with her. Turn away, she told herself. Just look away. But she couldn’t. Maybe she was looking for something, some flicker of the Larry who loved her, just beneath the surface.

She couldn’t find it. There was nothing behind his eyes but anger and hurt. He poised his hands over the strings without looking away. 

“Here’s to you, Ash.”


	4. Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're interested in listening while you read, the song Larry sings at the bar in this chapter is Snuff by Slipknot.

“He can't be fucking serious.” 

Maple’s voice, from far away. Ash vaguely registered the feeling of Ben’s hand on her shoulder, Sal shifting beside her, but they seemed the movements of shadows. The bar around her had sunken behind a veil, drifted away into the background, leaving only herself and Larry, immovable. Her heart was stone in her chest, sinking into the sticky floor beneath her. She wished she was going with it. 

The crowd around the platform rippled as music started to leak from the speakers, and the excitement among them was palpable as Larry leaned forward, so close to the microphone his lips were almost touching the metal. His voice poured out like smoke, weighing her down in the same way. It was rough, burning, someone pouring alcohol in an open wound. 

She hated it. 

_“Bury all your secrets in my skin._  
_Come away with innocence and leave me with my sins._  
_The air around me still feels like a cage  
_And love is just a camouflage for what resembles rage…”__

____

_____ _

There had been another time when Larry had written a song for her.

It was the summer before Freshman year. They'd marked it as the last real summer of their childhoods, and as such, spent it doing everything they could to make it as memorable as possible. They smoked their first cigarettes, stolen from Lisa’s purse. They stayed up late reading dirty stories in pilfered copies of Cosmo. They got so drunk that Larry fell out of the treehouse and broke his nose for the second time that year. 

It was also the summer Larry had finally told Ash about his father; about the guitar that had been a gift from him, and how it had been collecting dust in Larry’s closet since the day he left. Ash had pestered him all summer about picking it back up, just giving it one more try, but he had shot her down every step of the way. Eventually, she’d stopped nagging. 

But then he’d surprised her. 

As was tradition, they had a sleepover the night before school started, so they could walk together in the morning. They camped out in the treehouse, relishing one final night of warm air and starlight, watching black and white movies on the tiniest satellite TV known to man. Larry had gone inside under the guise of getting more snacks, and when he climbed back up through the floor, he had the guitar slung over his back. He was grinning ear to ear. She had never seen him smile like that. 

He crept towards her, too tall for the tree house even then, and knelt on the other end of her sleeping bag. His hands were shaking as he turned the guitar around and started to tune it. 

“You were right,” he’d said. “I got it out of the closet a couple weeks ago, but I didn't want to tell you in case I… Fucked it up or something I don't know. But I wrote something for you. Since this was, like… Your idea. Can I, uh… Can I play it for you?” 

She’d nodded, too afraid of shattering the moment to speak. 

The notes had been rough, not quite the right pace. He stopped once to start over, and his voice was shaky and cracked as he sang. It was still the most beautiful song she'd every heard. If she hadn't been so afraid, she would have kissed him that night, that song and the taste of s’mores on his tongue.

It seemed impossible to think that the boy who'd whispered about looking into her eyes and wanting to run away with her was the same as the man in front of her now, malice dripping from his lips. Her stomach lurched, knotting itself, and she took a step forward into the crowd, shrugging Ben’s hand off her shoulder. 

_“I still press your letters to my lips.”_

Another step, and Sal clambored to reach for her hand, to pull her back to them. She slipped out of his grasp. 

_“I couldn't face a life without your light.”_

She pushed her way to the center of the crowd and paused, blood rushing in her ears. The static was almost enough to block out the sound of him slanderous her name. He lifted his head enough to catch her eye, and she saw surprise flicker across his face before it hardened again. He was an idiot to think she would stand by and let him paint this picture of her. A coward. She felt herself take another step forward. 

_“So save your breath, I will not care._  
_I think I made it very clear_  
_You couldn't hate enough to love.  
_Is that supposed to be enough?”__

____

____

_____ _

_____ _

She was close enough to touch him now, if she leant forward just a little. It would be so easy to push him over, spill her drink on his feet, even take the step up onto the platform and punch him square in the jaw, which sounded the most satisfying. But her stomach twisted again, differently this time, and her objective had to change. She searched fervently for the closest exit, then turned on her heel and made a beeline for the backdoor. 

Sal was the first to reach her, doubled over in the parking lot, vomiting onto the pavement. God, why hadn’t she just gotten back on the fucking train? She caught a snippet of Larry’s before the door closed, spurring on another round of tequila hitting the concrete. Sal rubbed her back in small circles until the wave passed, and then offered her a cocktail napkin. 

“I didn’t think you had that much to drink.” 

Ash steadied herself, leaned back against the brick facade and sank to the ground. Sal followed her lead, his head dropping to her shoulder. “I didn't. I just didn't eat today.” 

That too had been because of Larry. She hated him. The same swell of anger she'd carried with her to New York surged in her chest. She couldn't believe she’d ever felt sorry for leaving him here.

More than she hated him, though, she hated herself. This was not Ashley Campbell, this pathetic girl with her head in her hands. Rather, it wasn't who she'd been before. It wasn’t Ash, who rode a motorcycle and went skinny dipping and knew who she was, even when people didn't like her for it. 

This was Ashley. Ashley, with the Wallstreet boyfriend and the high rise apartment. Ashley who ate kale salads and picked up her boss’ dry cleaning and forced herself to be polite. Ashley who had started living a truth that didn't belong to her a long time ago, and along the way had forgotten who she was. Being back in Nockfell had made that much clear, at least. 

The door opened again, allowing the sound of clapping and whistling to wash over them briefly. Maple stepped into the circle of light coming from the bulb above the door, flustered and in the verge of tears. Ash liked that about her; you never had to guess how she felt. It was a vulnerability Ash wished she could emulate, especially in times like these. 

“There you two are. We should leave. Ben’s on the warpath.” Sal raised an eyebrow. It was hard to imagine Ben, who caught flies in paper cups and released them outside, being on anything close to a “warpath.” She must have been able to tell they weren’t convinced, because she elaborated. 

“He mentioned something about making Larry ‘shit his own teeth,’” she used her fingers to make quotation marks in the air, “and then disappeared. I wasn’t fast enough to follow him.” She gestured to her stomach, the obvious impairment. Sal got to his feet.

“I’ll get him.” 

“Leave it.” Ash rolled her head back against the wall and closed her eyes. “He won't do anything. He just needs to blow off steam. Besides,” she shrugged. ”It's not like he wouldn’t deserve it.” 

Neither of them answered, and Ash turned her head again to look at them, brow furrowed. She caught the tail end of an exchanged look that put her on edge.

“What? What's that about?” She straightened, looking between them, half defensive, half confused. “He doesn't deserve it?” 

Sal let out a strangled “Well,” and Maple stuck a finger in her mouth to chew the nail, avoiding her eye. Ash laughed, hollow and one note. She wasn't sure why she’d expected a homecoming of any other kind. 

“You have got to be kidding.” 

“We’re not saying what he did was right.” Sal’s voice was quick and panicked. They were walking on eggshells again, she realized. She couldn't bring herself to look at them. It would kill her to see that same crumbling look in their eyes. “It’s just that, for Larry, this is sort of the best case scenario.” 

“He’s not in a good place, Ash. He hasn’t been since…” Maple paused, and Ash flinched. She knew what Maple wanted to say. Since you left. The words were so palpable she could almost see them forming in front of her. “In a long time.” 

“It sucks, but it's become common behavior. I think it's the only way he can process.” Sal, ever awkward in his comforting behaviors, patted her on the shoulder in a way that was meant to be reassuring. She shrugged him away. 

The three of them were quiet for some time, until Maple exhaled through pursed lips and put her hand on the door handle. “I'll go get Ben and we can all leave.” 

Sal looked between the two of them, and then offered his help. They disappeared back into the bar, Larry's voice accompanying them, leaving Ash alone with her thoughts. 

She had been feeling so wonderful less than an hour ago. Reunited with Maple and Sal, just enough alcohol in her bloodstream, she'd truly believed coming back had been the right thing to do. And now… 

She pulled her knees closer to her chest, dug in her back pocket for the crushed pack of cigarettes she'd brought ‘just for emergencies.’ She balanced one between her lips and lit it on the second try, breathing in so deeply she made herself cough. Even so, the tension in her shoulders relaxed, just a little. 

They had been such a novelty that summer, passed between the two of them like secrets. It made her feel funny, to know that her mouth touched the same place his had. They'd shared food, drinks, other things before, that she had never thought twice about. But this was so intimate. 

Maybe because they weren't supposed to be doing it; Lisa would have flayed them if she'd found out. Or maybe it was because she hadn't ever thought of him that way until that summer. He'd always just been Larry to her, starry eyed and sweet, if a little annoying. Her best friend. And then something changed. It was like someone had crawled inside her heart and flipped a switch, turned it on for the first time in her life. 

Larry wasn’t just Larry anymore. She hadn’t known at the time why, or what had changed, but everytime he handed her his cigarette, the butterflies in her stomach unraveled their wings just a little. Ironically, it had also been a cigarette that killed them. 

“I didn't think you did that anymore.” 

She'd been so caught up in the memory she hadn't heard the door open again. Larry was towering over her, back against the metal, watching her from the corner of his eye. Her blood felt thick in her veins, alien and cold. She looked around for Maple, for Sal, but they had abandoned her. Much like she'd done to them. 

“They're inside.” Larry's voice was drawling, low. The scent of alcohol on him was so strong, she could smell it from her perch on the concrete. “Where are you gonna run to now?” 

She didn't answer him. She didn't trust herself to speak. Flames lashed at her from the inside, wrapped themselves around her throat. If she opened her mouth, they would pour out of her and set the world on fire. She lit another cigarette. 

“I noticed you didn't stay for the end of your song. Don't you wanna know what happened?” 

“Go away.” 

“And miss the show?” Larry laughed. It felt like frost settling on her skin. “I don't think so.” 

“You’re drunk.” She felt his eyes on her, and for the first time since he'd come outside, she tilted her head up to look at him. The corner of his mouth curled up in a way that made her nauseous. His eyes were glassy, dim, almost black. A stranger's eyes. 

Larry lit a cigarette of his own before answering. 

“Imagine that. Guess I needed the courage to talk to you.” 

Ash stood and ground the cigarette, still mostly whole, into the pavement. She would rather walk home than wait another second with Larry standing over her, scowling. She folded her arms over her chest and took a few steps toward the road, but she could hear his heavy footfalls behind her. 

“Going home so soon?” He called after her in a sing-song, taunting her. Baiting her. “Come on, Ash. Don’t you want to catch up? I wanna hear all about your life in the big city.” She kept walking, lengthening her stride to put as much distance between them as possible. But his legs were longer, and he was just as fast. 

He caught up with her halfway across the parking lot and his fingers snaked around her wrist. She stopped, but didn't turn around. His touch burned against her skin. 

“Is it everything you wanted?” He had dropped his voice, just above a whisper. It was slimy and writhing, alive with hate. “Or is it just something else you can leave behind when you get bored?” 

Ash turned on him then, eyes blazing but damp. She jabbed him hard in the chest with her free hand, and he released her, stumbling backwards a step. “ _You_ are the coward, Johnson. Not me.” He laughed that icy laugh again and opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off. 

“You were too scared to try to make anything of yourself so you stayed in this podunk, shithole of a town and found a way to justify the fact that your life will never be anything other than oil and grease and a wicker basket of crumpled dollar bills that drunks leave for you on Friday nights, because they are the only people who can actually stomach what comes out of your mouth.” She was lying, trying to hurt him on purpose, and she knew it. But she couldn't stop. 

“So you’re mad at me because I didn't want to stay here and be nothing with you? Fine. But I'm not going to feel bad about that because that's all that happens to people who stay here. They are born nothing and they live a nothing life and then they die. They die nothing. A nobody. Just like you and everyone else who is too scared to leave.”

She had been yelling so loudly and speaking so fast that when she stopped she had to take several deep breaths. Larry closed his eyes. She couldn't register the look on his face, and that scared her. When he opened them again a second later, a smirk stretched across his face that reminded her of someone who had caught prey in a trap. 

“There she is.” He dropped his cigarette to the ground, stomped out the light. From behind him, Maple, Sal, and Ben, emerged from the darkness. She could see hurt on Maple's face, Ben’s mouth stretched thin and tight. There was the audible sound of Ash’s heart shattering at her feet. 

Ben stepped around Larry, who was still wearing a twisted expression of amusement, and put his hand on Ash’s shoulder. “Let's go home.”


	5. Five

Saturday morning bloomed with all the colors of a battered body, purple and yellow and red. Ben left early to make final decisions at the funeral home, leaving Ash to her own devices. Though this was just as well; the car ride home had been icy, to say the least. She'd tried once to apologize for what she’d said, (after all, she’d only been trying to hurt Larry,) but Ben had told her in no uncertain terms to leave it alone. So for the second time that day, she'd spent the majority of the trip deciding whether or not to open the door and roll out onto the asphalt. They'd gone to bed without speaking, and for that reason she was relieved to see his car missing from the driveway when she woke up. 

The summer before college, her father had added a sunroom to the back of the house. When she hadn’t been getting into trouble with the boys or taking Maple to doctors appointments, the two of them had spent their days there together, talking about all the things Ash couldn't wait to do when she finally had the space to spread her wings. It seemed like a dream to her now, something so shrouded in her memory she couldn't be sure it was truly real. Still, as she stepped through the archway into the morning sun, there was a fleeting moment where she thought she might find him there, sipping coffee and watching the sky fade back to blue. 

She settled on the wicker bench and hugged a cushion to her chest, pulling her knees up to her chin. The light was only just making its way into the room, but it was already warm and cheerful, bright. A cardinal landed on a nearby tree, and she followed it while it hopped from branch to branch before taking off again to make circles around the yard. After a moment, it landed once more and disappeared into the leaves. She wondered why it chose to stay in her backyard, certainly nowhere special, when it had the whole universe to explore. 

In a way, wasn’t that what she had done? She wanted the idea of freedom so badly, and then, when she finally had it, it overwhelmed her. So she made herself a yard. A new tree, yes, a new nest. But still, a way of confining herself, of restricting herself. The only difference was that this time it was in New York, and not Nockfell. In both places, she had clipped her own wings. Or maybe she had never really learned how to fly at all. 

“Everything is so hard, dad.” She looked at the place next to her on the bench, tried to manifest him there, in an argyle sweater and boat shoes, balancing his coffee on a khaki’d knee. “Everything is so hard all the time.”

“I know.” A whisper on the wind maybe, or a hallucination, but enough. Enough to be reassuring and to keep her talking. 

“I keep thinking I'm making all the right decisions. It seemed so cut and dry before; go to school, get a job. I did that. I know what's supposed to come next. I know I'm supposed to be happy, but somehow I just feel…” She took a deep breath. “Lost. Disconnected. I thought coming home would help me see that New York was where I belonged. Remind me of why I left.” Ash stopped to look out over the yard again. It stretched out and disappeared into a line of trees. On the other side of them, through a small but thick forest, was Lake Wendigo. She wished they were working there together now, on the rocky banks, with poles in the water, instead of being here, alone. She was always alone. 

“And has it?” Her father's voice again, clearer now, more sure. She could almost feel the weight of him on the seat next to her. 

“No.” Barely audible. Heavy with something she didn't understand. “Instead… I can't remember why I wanted to go at all.” Tears clouded her vision, made the trees look blurry and distant. “I miss being home. I miss mom, and Ben. I miss Sal, and Maple, and Todd. Even Larry.” The first drop broke loose, carving a path down her cheek. Another followed, and then another, until she was resolved to them. 

“Oh, Possum. Don't cry.” 

“I miss you the most,” She continued, choked. From the corner of her eye, through the mist, she thought she could see him. Shadowy and thin, like he had been in the study, but almost certainly there. She resisted the urge to turn and look, in case he went away, but she put her hand down in the slave between them. After a moment, she felt a pocket of cold air settle between her fingers. 

“I miss you too, sweetheart. But I'm already gone. All we can do in this life is love people while they're with us. Even when they're mad at us. Even when they hate us. Because when they're gone, we're not going to care about any of that. All that will matter is how they made us happy.” 

“Did I make you happy?” She finally turned to face him. He was smiling at her, shivering like television snow, but healthy looking, and real, watching her over his spectacles. 

“More than I ever dreamed I could be.” 

She lifted a hand to wipe her eyes and she opened them again she was alone in the sunroom, Ben’s voice calling to her from inside the house. The sun was higher in the sky than she remembered, and she suddenly felt groggy and confused. Ben’s head appeared from the archway, looking just as tired as she felt. The bags under his eyes could have given Larry’s a run for their money, to be sure. 

“Oh, good. You're awake.” 

“Awake?” Something in her head switched off. Of course, if had been a dream. Of course. He stepped fully into the room, wiping his hands on a dish towel. 

“I wanted to let you sleep for a while longer, but I know you need time to get ready.” He glanced at his watch. “We have to leave in a little less than an hour.” Misunderstanding must have shown on her face because he quickly added, “For the wake.”

She repeated the words, her mouth dry, and then nodded. “I'll be in in just a minute.” He turned to go back into the house and then paused, remembering something. He fished in his pocket and resurfaced housing a neatly folded piece of paper. He shifted on his feet and looked down at the ground. 

“When I went to bring dad's suit and pick up his stuff today…” He cleared his throat, tried again. “Anyway, um… They said this was in his pajama pocket. It’s for you.” She reached for it, carefully, and then Ben made to go inside once again. 

“Ben.” He paused, tilted his gaze towards her just a little. “About what I said last night. I didn't mean that. Really. I don't think you're nothing.” The corner of his mouth turned up just a little, and hers did too. 

“I know.” He laughed, nostalgic and distant. “Love you, Possum.” 

“Love you too, Bambie.” 

When he was gone, and she could hear him shuffling around in the kitchen, she snuck her way past and up the stairs, into her bedroom. She shut the door softly behind her, and set the note on her dresser. She would save it, she decided, for when she really needed strength. 

The room itself, much like everything else in Nockfell had been, was frozen in time. The walls were still the same shade of lilac, and the one with her closet door on it had been coated unevenly with chalkboard paint. Although the names and messages had been long erased, she could still see the outlines and the faded colors where they had once been. A dresser, and a bookshelf, both dusty, and an easel used only once or twice but somehow still covered in paint. A canopy hung above the bed, one that she hated as a teenager, but had grown on her since she’d been in the room again. She had been lucky. She wished she could’ve realized that sooner.

Dressing for the wake was a slow process. Ash changed three or four times, every outfit feeling heavier on her than the last. Eventually, a sweater and leggings, too hot for the warm summer air, but the only thing she felt comfortable in in the end. She forwent makeup, to save herself the trouble of constantly having to check to see if her mascara was running. Or that’s what she told herself. She had never been one to cry in front of others in the first place. 

When she caught her reflection in the mirror above the dresser, she looked sickly, and exhausted. A migraine blossomed between her eyes and she shuffled in one of the drawers for her emergency bottle of Advil, which long ago had also doubled as a hiding spot for Larry’s own “medication.” She took two, and then decided on another, before shoving the bottle into her purse. She hoped he wouldn’t be there tonight. Partly because she wasn’t ready to face him again, and partly because she knew she would want to go to him for comfort. After all, that had always been their way before. She wasn’t sure what would hurt her worse in the end; him turning her away, or him being there for her as though nothing had happened. 

Although the latter really seemed out of the realm of possibility. 

Ash took a minute to sit down on the edge of her bed, brushing the canopy out-of-the-way. She took a few grounding breaths, tried to remember what her yoga instructor had taught her. She wished she had gone to more than three lessons. Finally, deciding it was okay to need it now, she stood and picked up the note again, trembling just a little. She unfolded the paper carefully, like someone unwrapping a particularly precious Christmas gift, and smoothed it flat on the table top. 

It had obviously been written a long time ago. A few months, at least. The paper was worn and had some tearing along the folds. It looked like her father had carried it everywhere with him, just in case. So they would find it no matter what. There was a coffee stain in the corner, the round rim of a mug that had been placed there in passing. The paper itself smelled like medicine and cleaning supplies; the smell of hospital halls, mothballs, people gone too soon. The handwriting was shaky and almost unintelligible, but still his. Still her father’s. Ben’s voice from downstairs called out to her, asking if she was ready to go.

_My only daughter,_ the note read.   
_I remember you in fleeting moments. I love you in all of them._  
 _-Dad._

“Ash!” Ben’s voice again, louder. He was just at the bottom of the stairs. She folded the note the same way it had been when it was given to her, and tucked it in the top drawer of her dresser bar in the back, behind the clothes she could never hope to fit into again. “We have to go!”

“I’m ready, I’m ready.” She couldn’t help the hint of annoyance creeping into her voice as she shut off the light and rushed to meet Ben on the steps. “I’m ready,” she said again. 

And at least for today, at least for this, she was.


	6. SIX

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning! This chapter contains a description of self-harm. If you or someone you know is effected by these issues, please reach out for help.

“A ghost?” 

It was early the next morning, and Sal and Ash were in the back pew of the Phelps Ministry, sipping weak tea and waiting for guests to start arriving. Maple, overcome with morning sickness, had excused herself to use the restroom. Ash, once they were alone, had seized the opportunity to tell Sal about her encounter with the other kind. Or so she hoped. 

“I'm not sure… It sounds crazy.”

“Not that crazy.” 

Ash laughed, mixed her drink with the plastic stirrer, and took a sip before responding. “Ben says I was sleeping but… I don't remember falling asleep out there. Or even laying down. And it felt so real, like... I could feel him touching me…” 

Ash looked at her hand, stretched out her fingers. She could still feel it, the cold that had seeped through her skin. Sal scrutinized her over the edge of his paper cup and leaned back against the low arm rest. “Maybe it was,” he said eventually, shrugging.”It wouldn't be the strangest thing to happen here. What happened when he went away?”

“I don't know.” Ash watched her reflection in the murky water, and was glad for the distortion of her face that the ripples in its surface caused. Last night, after the visitation, she'd cried so long and so hard that her eyes were still swollen and pink. It embarrassed her to no end, and she was glad Ben had bought her story about allergies on their way to the church that morning. “I looked away and when I looked back, he was just… Gone.” 

Sal hmmed and they were both quiet, let in their own thoughts, until Maple reappeared, looking radiant, but tired. A few steps behind her was Travis, who appeared to be willing the floor to open up beneath him and swallow him whole. 

“Glad to see I didn't miss anything good,” Maple said, sliding into the pew in front of them, with some difficulty. “Look who I found on the way back from the bathroom.” She gestured in Travis’ direction, and Sal got up to hug him. Travis softened almost immediately. 

“Ash, you remember my boyfriend, Travis.” 

“Of course.” Ash slid closer to them on the bench and they shook hands. “Thanks for coming.” 

“No problem. Sorry for your loss. Sal says your dad was a really wonderful guy.” Ash nodded, offered a small smile, and Sal turned his attention fully to Travis. 

“Have you seen him yet?”

Travis shook his head. 

“I think he's still in back with Ben,” Maple added, and Travis relaxed even more. He let out a breath of air that was almost a laugh, and ran a hand through his hair. 

“If I'm lucky he won't notice I'm here at all.” 

A few more people had begun to arrive, some Ash recognized and some she didn't, but she excused herself to scoot out of the pew and make her way towards the doors. It was easier to play hostess than it was to be the grieving daughter. She busied herself with greetings and directions to the kitchen and tried not to let show just how much she hated the constant barrage of people saying how sorry they were. That had always been her biggest issue with funerals. So many people were sorry for something that wasn't their fault. 

Ben came to relieve her after half an hour or so, Pastor Phelps in tow, and she took her place in the front row, next to her mother, where she felt more like an object on display than a person. The procession of guests must have slowed, because it wasn't long before her brother joined them too, and the pastor approached the podium. What little chatter there had been ceased, and Ash felt a tightness form in her chest. 

“I have laid to rest many residents of Nockfell, but I have never been as effected as I am at the death of Aaron Campbell.” Pastor Phelps’ voice was loud and booming, the way she imagined the voice of God sounded. Fitting, for a priest. Next to her, Betty sobbed shakily. “He was a hard worker, a loving husband, and a caring father.”

He _had_ been a caring father. How many nights had he stayed up with her when she had a bad dream? He’d made it to every volleyball game, every choir concert, every play. She could remember his voice at college graduation, louder than all the other parents, cheering her name. She cherished every cup of hot chocolate, every blueberry pancake, every time he’d embarrassed her by saying something stupid in front of her friends. She wished she had told him that when he was around to hear it. She should have told him how much she loved him more. 

She should have been there when he died. 

Ben nudged her hard in the ribs, and she looked up, drawn sharply of her reverie. All eyes were on her, and it took her a moment to realize that she'd been called up to give her speech. She had been too lost in thought to move. She scrambled to her feet and onto the platform, less than gracefully, her heart beat so loud she was sure everyone in the room could hear it. She wished she had made Ben speak instead. 

She took a piece of paper from her cardigan pocket, a speech she had spent ages on, and unfolded it. It had seemed perfect when she reread it last night. A little funny, a little sad. Easy to get through. But now the letters swam before her eyes, and the sentences she could make out were clunky and strange. She put the paper face down on the podium and closed her eyes. 

“I uh… I wrote a speech.” Her voice was shaky and far away, but she pushed ahead. “I actually wrote a really good speech. But I'm not going to read it to you today.” She opened her eyes, finally, and they found her friends in the crowd. Sal, holding Travis’ hand in his lap. Maple, and Chug, with Soda between them, her head on Maple’s shoulder. Maple caught her eye and smiled, the smallest smile, but big enough. 

“I don't think I realized, until I saw all of you sitting here today, how many lives my father touched. When you lose your dad, it’s so easy to get caught up in that. In being hurt. But I didn't just lose my father. All of you here lost someone. A friend. A brother. A teacher. A business partner. Some of us will feel this loss more greatly. For many people here, my father was apart of their everyday lives. And for some of you, you may not even notice he's gone. Until you can't find his voice during game day at the Mill. Or your child brings home a paper that's been graded in someone else’s hand. 

That sense of loss, though, no matter how big or small, is why we’re here today. That’s why they say funerals are for the living. We look for a community in times like these so that we feel less alone. A community of empathy. A community of grief. 

And we should grieve. It's healthy. It's rewarding, because when we grieve, we can start to heal. We can start to move on with our lives, whether it's tomorrow, or a week from now, or six months from now. So I'm not going to tell you all about what a wonderful person my dad was. Because you already know. Maybe not in the way Ben and I do. Not in a way that's counted in bedtime stories and birthdays. But in the way that is unique to you. In the way that he impacted your life. 

So grieve today. But then start to heal. Because if I know anything about the kind of person my dad was, he wasn't someone to dwell on sadness. He would want you all to spend your time being with the people around you, not crying over someone who's gone. All we can do in this life is love people while they're with us. My father told me that once. Love people while they're with you. 

That's what my dad would want.” 

\---  
Rain had started to pour by the time the service was over. It came down in heavy sheets, making the path to the grave site muddy and difficult to navigate. Pastor Phelps gave another small eulogy as they lowered the casket into the ground, and then the crowd started to dissipate, little by little. Ben had organized a reception at the only nice restaurant in town, but Ash waved him of when it was time to leave. She would get a ride, she said. She needed a minute to herself, without someone asking her if they could get her anything, or if she needed to talk. 

The only place to get out of the rain were the steps of the mausoleum, old and crumbling. She settled on the top stair and fished in her pocket for her cigarette case. She didn't smoke often anymore, but she could forgive herself for this one. She had already guessed before she'd left the city that a trip home might be just the thing to restart a bad habit. 

She leaned against one of the columns, pressed her forehead to the slick marble. She was drained, and wet, and although the day was warm, there was enough of a breeze to make her shiver. Poetic justice, she thought, though she couldn't say how. The cemetery was empty now, and she relished the quiet of it all while she smoked. She could see why people chose to come here when they died. If was peaceful; if a little morbid. 

She could start to feel the warmth of the dog end of her cigarette between her fingers. It had been so long, but the same intrusive thought came about her, the same way it did every time she went to put out a smoke. Most days she could ignore it, but now she hiked up her skirt. Her thigh was littered with small round scars, high enough to stay hidden. She watched as ash fell from the tip of the cigarette onto the step below her. Falling Ash. Maybe there was poetic justice in that, too. 

She picked a place between two old circles and pressed the fire to her skin. She winced, but didn't withdraw until the cigarette was extinguished. When she pulled it away, there was a new circle. Pink, and raw, and burning. 

“I didn't think you did that anymore.” Larry's voice. She dropped the cigarette butt and pulled her skirt back down quickly. The fabric felt like knives against her skin. 

“What are you doing here?” 

Larry was at the bottom of the steps. She must have missed him, blind to everything else except her own selfish heartache. He put his hands up defensively. “I'm not here to pick a fight with you.” 

Ash stood and folded her arms over her chest. She wondered if he had been there all day, and she had simply overlooked him. He was dressed for the funeral, much more put together than he had been the other night at the bar. Still handsome. Always handsome. 

“Then leave.”

“I just came to pay my respects. I didn't think anyone would still be here. Especially not you.” 

“Are you gatekeeping my father's funeral plot?” 

Larry rolled his eyes. “Fuck, Ashley, would you chill? Please. I'm really not here to fight.” 

She relaxed a little, enough to uncross her arms. Larry pulled a pack of Marlboro’s from his back pocket and lit one, offering the box to her. She plucked a cigarette out, warily. He lit them both, and they stood there a minute, looking out over the wet grounds. The worst part of the rain had subsided, but it was still drizzling, leaving pockmarks on Larry's dress shirt. 

“How are you doing?” 

Ash bit back the urge to respond sarcastically. “Not great.” She touched her thigh absentmindedly. His eyes followed her hand, and his brow furrowed. She pretended to brush something off of her skirt. 

“You think you’ll be okay?” 

“Eventually.” She took a long drag on her cigarette. “I didn't know you Ave my dad were so close.” 

Larry looked away.”We weren't,” he said quickly, but she could see the lie on his face. She hardened. “I just thought it was the right thing to do.”

“Since when do you care about the right thing to do?” 

“Shouldn't I be asking you the same thing?” Their momentary treaty was broken. She had done it, but the bite in his voice was enough to drive away the glimmer of guilt she’d felt. She dropped the cigarette and ground it out with her heel. 

“I don't have to keep defending myself to you, Larry.” 

“But you will.” He took a step up, and she backed away. Her back hit the stone face of the building, hard. “Because that's who you are, Ash. You at like you don't give a shit what anyone thinks about you, but you do. You’re obsessed with the idea that everyone has to like you.”

“Not you.” She pressed her palms flat against the wall. “I couldn't care less what you think about me. I hate you.” She spit the last sentence at him like acid, like she wanted it to burn through him. 

He took another step towards her, onto the second stair. He took a long pull on his own cigarette, and when he spoke, the smoke swallowed her whole. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” She clenched her first, panic tightening her throat. He took the last step, inches away from her. She needed to look for an escape, to duck away from him, but she couldn't take her eyes off his. 

“Good. ‘Cause I hate you too.” 

And then he closed the gap between them, and he kissed her.


	7. Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains strong religious imagery as well as mentions of abuse.   
> If you or someone you know is affected by these issues, please read at your own risk. For a list of crisis resources, please visit afsp.org/find-support.

He kissed her.

He kissed her, he kissed her, he kissed her. 

Too rough, too angry, but she let him. And after a moment, she kissed him back. Even when he’d kissed her before, so many years ago, there had always been a desperation to it, a need that neither one of them ever addressed. Now, there was more of it, rawer, and something else too. Hurt, maybe, or rage. Six years of an unresolved anger neither of them had truly earned. He gripped her waist, too tightly, and she twisted her hands in his hair. She could feel the bruises forming under his finger tips, but she craved them. A reminder, when the memory felt hazy tomorrow, that he had been there. That he had been real. 

He pulled her lower lip between his teeth, and she tasted blood. It was the copper that brought her back, that strange intermingling of metal and the gin on his breath, that made her break away from him. She untangled herself as quickly as she had woven around him, and her palms connected hard with his chest. He stumbled backwards, enough for her to sidestep out of this reach. She jumped into the grass, heels sinking into the damp earth, and wheeled on him, fuming. 

“What the FUCK?” He leaned against the column, smirking, and crossed his arms. Her vision pinholed. “What the fuck is your problem? You show up here,” she gestured wildly to the cemetery, “on the day I bury my father, and you assault me?” 

He laughed, and she felt a scream welling in her throat. “What the hell is so funny?”

“I ‘assaulted’ you?” He made quotation marks in the air.

She reddened. He hadn't, really, but she was too embarrassed by how fast she’d given in to him to admit it. “Yes!”

His mouth thinned.”Don't say shit like that, Ash.” 

“Larry. You can't just-”

“What.” His voice was so commanding, so hard, that the words died in her throat. She had never been frightened of him before, but in that moment, she could see why someone might be. “I can’t what, Ash?”

She was a mouse, preparing to be stomped to death by an elephant. She tried to make her own voice just as strong. 

“You can’t just do whatever you want.” 

“Why not?” He faltered, just a little. She had forgotten: That was the thing about elephants. They were terrified of mice. “That’s what you did.” 

They were at a stalemate. She refused to defend her choices to him again, and he seemed to have run out of things to say. His eyes bore into hers so long she thought time had stopped. He was burning a hole through her head, looking beyond her somehow. It made her feel naked, but she wouldn't be the first to look away. She had already shown enough weakness.

Eventually he tore away from her. She followed his line of sight to the stained glass window on the side of the church, a few hundred feet away. It was difficult to make our from this distance, but she had seen it enough to know what the distorted shapes ahead of her created up close. 

Mary Magdalene, in a blue gown, facing away from the onlooker. She was on her knees in front of Jesus, her water jug overturned and spilling frosted crystal through diamond grass. He was blessing her, and both their arms were raised in salvation. Jesus’ head and the glass around it were a slightly different color than the rest of the panel. They’d been replaced after a rock had been thrown through it when they were in high school, though no one ever found out who’d had the guts to vandalize the church. 

Ash shifted so she could look between Larry and the window, unsure why he seemed so vexed by it after their blow up. She opened her mouth to ask, but he beat her to the punch.

“I did it.” He was suddenly so calm, a shift in mood that made her uncomfortable. She didn't understand what he was talking about, not that it mattered. Larry was speaking for himself. She was a bystander, lucky enough to hear. 

“I threw the rock, Sophomore year.” He took a few steps toward the building, closer to her, but he didn't acknowledge her. He was somewhere else. “Sal came to me and asked me if it was okay for him to ask you out. He said we were such good friends, he didn't want to make things uncomfortable by turning me into a third wheel. So he wanted to ask me first. He said he thought he was in love with you. But he would put that aside if I felt weird about it.” 

She had never heard this story before, but she knew how it ended. Sal _had_ asked her out Sophomore year. They’d dated for a little while and amicably broke things off after a few months. Nothing changed, except that they started kissing other people. They were better friends, anyway. What her brief fling with Sal had to do with this story though, she couldn’t guess. Larry hadn’t admitted to having feelings for her until almost a year later, and he never stopped spending time with them or acted uncomfortable during their time together. 

“If he was willing to pretend he didn’t have feelings for you for my sake, it seemed like the only option I had was to do the same. So I told him it was fine. That I was fine. But I wasn’t. I went for a walk to… I don’t know. Clear my head. Blow off some steam. And I ended up here. Maybe because I knew it would be quiet, I don’t know. But I saw that window and all I could feel was anger. Not at Sal or at you, but at God. Because I had spent my whole life trying to get you to notice me. And somehow…” He took a deep breath and turned away from the church to face her. “Somehow you had only seen him.” 

She wanted to tell him that it hadn’t been like that at all, but her mouth wouldn’t move. Something had disconnected her muscles from her brain, and she could do nothing but stare, and feel guilty. 

“There were candles lit, or the light was flickering, or something. But the way it was hitting his face… It made it look like he was laughing at me. So I picked up a rock and I threw it as hard as I could. I didn’t even really realize it until I heard the sound of the glass breaking. And then I just… Ran. And I never told anyone. I felt horrible about it. I didn’t mean for it to break. I just wanted him to stop laughing.” A tear slid it’s way down the sharp angle of Larry’s nose. Ash resisted the urge to wipe it away. “When Pastor Phelps and the rest of the congregation started asking for donations to get it fixed, I cleared out my savings account. I put it all in an envelope and left it in the mailbox. It wasn’t a lot, definitely not enough to cover the damage, but enough to make me feel better. I don’t even believe in God, but I felt like I’d let him down somehow.” 

“Why are you telling me this? Why now?” 

“Because I still feel like you don’t see me.” He shoved his hands in his pockets, scuffed the ground with the toe of his dress shoe. “The first day I realized they had fixed it was the same day that I kissed you for the first time. Really kissed you, you know? And it was like I had proved something. And I was kind of glad this ugly, taunting, thing was able to see it. And then you left, and I understood. I hadn’t proven anything except that he was right, and that you would never really see me. Even now. I’m standing right in front of you and you still don’t fucking see me.” His eyes were angry again when he met hers, heartbreak on every inch of his face. 

“Why can’t you fucking see me?” 

“I…” Ash searched for words that evaded her, unsure of the right thing to say. She could see him, physically. She didn’t know what he wanted her to see beneath that, what he had been trying to show her that she had overlooked. And she hated that somehow, although he had been in the wrong, he had managed to make her feel so small. Just like he had at the bar. Just like he had on the day she left. Larry was the only person who had ever made her feel fragile and weak. She had loved him for it, once. Now she wished it was him they’d buried instead. 

“Ash!” A voice rolled like thunder towards them from the front of the church. She had been saved by the bell, and she turned as quickly as possible to locate its source. There was a man striding towards them, tall and dark haired, in an expensive looking suit. Jesse. His face was twisted, and as he got closer she could tell that he was gnawing on the inside of his cheek. She winced. 

Jesse stopped at her side, looking over Larry warily before turning his attention on Ash. “You okay? Who’s this?” Ash glanced at Larry, who’s eyes were round with surprise and something that felt strangely like contempt. She considered the truth, and then shook her head dismissively. 

“I’m fine. Jesse, this is Larry. Larry, this is Jesse Gabel.” Jesse’s brow furrowed. 

“Larry. Larry Johnson?” Larry stuck out his hand, and Jesse shook it. Just once, and hard. 

“The same.” Larry’s voice was drawling, bored. Ash stiffened. A tense moment hung between them, and then Jesse looked away. The corner of Larry’s mouth pulled upwards. 

“I stopped by the restaurant first, but your brother said you were still here. I didn’t want you to be alone today.” Jesse put his hand on the side of her face, tenderly. She leaned into his palm. In her peripheral, she could see Larry roll his eyes and look away. “I should have come with you right away. I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay. Your timing is perfect, actually. I was just saying goodbye.” Ash put her hand over his and laced their fingers together before lowering them both to her side. She was never this affectionate with him, but now it was a power move. They were in a stand-off, she and Larry, and Jesse gave her an advantage to win. She turned back to Larry, who focused on everything but her face, and nodded at him curtly. “Thanks for coming.” 

Larry grunted, and turned to head towards the plot of recently overturned Earth where Ash’s father had been buried. She and Jesse moved in the opposite direction, towards the entrance to the cemetery, and the small parking lot where Jesse’s car was waiting. The further away from Larry they walked, the tighter Jesse gripped her hand. By the time they reached the pavement, Ash’s fingers were throbbing. 

“You’re hurting me.” She pulled at one of his fingers with her freehand, but he didn’t let go. He stopped on the passenger side of the car and wrenched open the door. He didn’t release his grip until she was in the car, slamming the door so quickly behind her that she was almost caught in it. He stepped in behind the wheel and turned the key, the engine roaring to life beneath them, but he didn’t drive away. Instead, he fixed his gaze out the front window at the street, and gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. 

He didn’t speak for a very long time. 

“Do you think I’m stupid?” 

For the second time today, she didn’t know how to respond. “I…” 

“I said,” Jesse’s voice mounted. “Do you think I’m stupid?” 

“No.” She croaked, barely a whisper. She tried again. “No.” 

“You promised me, Ashley. You said you were coming home for your family.” 

“I did, I-” 

“Don’t lie to me.” 

“Jesse, I didn’t know he would-”

“BULLSHIT.” He pulled at the steering wheel, and the car rattled. “I should have never let you come alone. I should have known that you would pull something like this.” He backed out of the space and pulled out of the parking lot, turning down the main road. It only took a few seconds for her to realize they were going far too fast. 

“Jesse.” Ash fought to keep her voice steady as trees whipped past them. “Slow down.” 

“I knew you couldn’t be alone. You can’t keep your fucking legs closed, can you?” He was picking up speed. Ash watched a stop sign disappear in the rearview. The sound of her heart was filling her ears. “I give you one piece of my trust and you throw it away. Absolutely worthless slut.” 

Ash closed her eyes. “Jesse, slow down, please.” She heard him laugh in the seat next to her, angry and cold. 

“Why? I thought Ashley Campbell wasn’t afraid to die.” The car stopped, hard. Ash’s entire body slammed against the seatbelt, and she felt the burn of the nylon spring to her shoulder and her chest. The wind had been knocked out of her, and it took her several shaky breaths before she felt she could open her eyes. They were parked in front of the restaurant. A group of people who had stepped outside to smoke were watching them intently, huddled together under the veranda. 

Still shaking, Ash looked over at Jesse, who was watching her too. All the anger had evaporated from his face; He looked sad and burnt out. “Ash,” he reached across the car to her, and she flinched. He paused, and then put his hand gently on her thigh. “I’m sorry. I only get so angry because I love you. You know that, right?” She didn’t answer, and his fingernails dug into her flesh. 

“Right?”   
“Yes.” She looked away from him, out the window. 

“It makes me crazy to see you around another man. It’s just because I know no one could ever love you as much as I do.” He moved to put his hand in her hair, brushing the pad of his thumb against her cheek. It made her feel like bugs were crawling on her skin. “You’d be nothing without me. Is that what you want to be, Ash? Nothing?” His voice was sickly sweet, coddling, for all the meanness of his words. 

“No.” 

“I didn’t think so. I know you didn’t mean to make me mad, baby. Let’s go have a nice dinner, huh? It’s been a long day for both of us.” He retracted his hand and turned off the car, checking himself in the fold-down mirror. She made a move to get out of the car, and had pulled back on the handle when he grabbed her wrist. Not hard, but enough to hold her there. 

“I love you, Ashley.” She closed her eyes, tried to picture someone else’s face. 

“I love you, too.”


	8. EIGHT

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has a few minor mentions of blood, but is otherwise warning free. Enjoy!

She was back in the graveyard.

She couldn’t remember how she’d gotten here, or why she’d come. It was dark, and although the sky was peppered with stars, they did little to shed any light on her surroundings. Her bare feet made impressions in the ground, still damp and soft from the rain. 

Ash moved through the headstones like a ghost. She wasn’t sure where she was going, only that something was pulling her in that direction. An invisible string, tied to her core. She hadn’t remembered the cemetary being this big; the air was uncharacteristically cool for summer, and it bit at her through her pajamas. Still, she couldn’t turn back. She thought it might have been her father’s grave, piled high with fresh dirt, but when she paused there, the pull continued. 

It carried her to the church, to the heavy oak doors, and then through them, into the main hall. The ceilings stretched endlessly above her, and in front of her she could see something strewn across the tile floor, glittering in the technicolor moonlight coming in through the stained glass windows. She stepped toward it, cautious. As she approached, she realized it was fragments of glass. Amid them was a stone, round and polished and black as coal. 

Ash felt a gust of wind and turned to see the image of Mary Magdalene and Jesus, the faceless woman at His feet. As it was before, there was a hole where His head had been, and around it the glass had fallen away and cracked.

But she had only just been here, and the window had been fixed. And Larry was certainly too old to come back and destroy it again. She took another step towards the pane, and then there was a sharpness in her foot that made her yelp. She fell into the pew and examined her sole, already slick with blood. A piece of the window had sliced through her skin and lodged itself there. She winced as she tried to pull it free, and when it finally came loose she tried to examine it as best she could in the darkness. It took her a moment to realize it was a mouth. A familiar one, but not one that belonged to the window. She couldn’t place it until it opened, and Larry’s voice came out, echoing in the emptiness. 

“Why can’t you see me?”

Startled, she dropped the shard, but the voice continued. It asked nothing else, and it seemed to come from all around her. The other windows were talking too, all one after the other, each louder than the last until she pressed her hands over her ears and begged for it to stop. 

It did, though she had no idea how long it had continued. She uncovered her ears and listened hard for any remnant of the voices or the question she could not answer. There was silence. She took a few deep breaths and when she felt steady enough, she stepped out of the pew and into the aisle. The glass was gone, but she left a footprint as she walked, etched in blood. She looked around at the windows, at the floor for any sign that what she’d seen had been real, but nothing was out of place. 

And then his voice again, this time just one, and coming from the pulpit. 

“Ash.” 

She stopped, afraid to get any closer. She couldn’t see him there though, beyond the podium, and when he called to her again, she gave in and moved towards the sound. She stopped at the bottom of the platform, peering into the shadows. There was no one there. She called for him, and her voice echoed until it distorted and she no longer recognized it as her own. He did not answer. 

A raindrop fell from above her and splashed against her head. She reached up on instinct to touch the place where it had landed, but when she pulled her hand away, her fingers were sticky and dark. Not rain. Blood. Another droplet hit her shoulder, staining her t-shirt, and she looked up, heart pounding. 

The cross above the pulpit had been turned upside down, and someone was on it. She stepped backwards, forgetting about her own injury, and slipped. She fell hard against the floor. From here she could better see the cross in its entirety, and the moonlight danced on the surface of the nails that held them in place, as though someone had shined them after the fact. But their hands and feet didn’t bleed, and she couldn’t tell where the blood had come from until a flash of lightning flooded the hall, and she could see the throat had been cut from ear to ear. Below the gash was that mouth again, and the familiar curve of a nose, and eyes shut. His hair fell away from him in a cascade, long and still moving, alive. 

It was Larry, pale even in the darkness. Larry on the cross, Larry’s blood on her clothes, Larry dead. She couldn’t move. She was glued to the floor, throat tight and struggling to breathe. And then he opened his eyes, pupil’s blown and glassy. 

“Run.”

Ash sat bolt upright, sunlight streaming through her bedroom window. She was home, in her twin sized bed, Jesse asleep on the floor next to her. She gasped, desperate for air, and touched her head. There was no blood, dry or otherwise, and none on her shoulder either. She threw back the covers and pulled her foot into her lap to examine it, but it was whole and showed no signs of her having even been outside. There was no cut, no scar, no offer of meaning or sanity. She groaned and fell back against the mattress, rolling into her stomach and burying her face in the pillow. 

Beside her, she heard Jesse stirring. She didn't look up, and after a moment she felt his weight next to her on the bed, and she pushed herself further against the wall to make room for him. When he wrapped his arms around her, she traded the pillow for his chest. Jesse rested his chin on her head and they stayed that way until the light had filled the room and they heard Ben passing in the hall on his way to give her mother her morning medication. 

In moments like these, she could remember why she had fallen in love with him in the first place. He seemed not so scary when his hands were at her waist instead of at her throat. 

They had brunch with Ben, who had taken the day off, and he and Jesse discussed fishing trips, where they disagreed on the best spots, and the upcoming season of football, where they agreed on who they thought should lose. Afterwards, Ash caught up on emails and Jesse and Ben headed upstairs to sort through more of Aaron’s things. She hadn’t been able to go back into the study since the picture incident, and neither of them pressured her to try. Sadness hung over her like a cloud, but she relished the feeling of normalcy the afternoon carried with it. 

Some time later, Ash climbed the stairs with two cups of tea and a stealy grin, a magazine tucked under her arm. The door to her mother’s bedroom was shut, but she could hear her behind it, talking back to the women on All My Children as though they could hear her. Ash knocked, and waited for Betty to make a small sound of acknowledgment before she entered. 

Growing up, Betty had been something of a supermom, at least to Ash. She worked part-time, so she could be home when the kids got back from school. She was at every PTA meeting, every softball game, every soccer match. They had family dinner on Sundays and even when her father had first gotten sick, Betty had taken him to doctor’s appointments and administered drugs with a smile on her face and perfectly coiffed hair. 

The woman before her now was an alien in her mother’s body. The room itself was dim, the curtains drawn, and the only light coming from the TV set on the dresser. It smelled like cigarettes and sweat, and the bed was littered in tissues and nicotine gum wrappers. Betty’s hair, still done up from the day before, was wild and frizzy, bobby pins poking out at odd angles. She hadn’t taken her makeup off either, and mascara ran down her face in droves. Ash held her place at the threshold, taking her in. A stray thought struck her; If she wasn’t careful, she might lose her mother, too. 

She set the teacups on top of a book on the nightstand, and picked her way carefully across the hardwood to pull back the curtains. Light overtook the bedroom and Betty blinked against it, disgruntled. The mess was worse than Ash had thought, the sun revealing stains and spills and something on the vanity covered in mold. Her mother was still in her funeral dress. 

“Can you believe Babe still doesn’t know J.R. married her twin sister?” Betty gestured in disbelief at the soap on the screen. Ash considered ignoring it - The last thing she wanted was to talk about the lives of fictional people when her own life felt like such a mess - But she thought better of it and shrugged, clearing a space in the mountain of kleenex and climbing into the bed next to her. 

“I thought Babe didn’t know she had a twin sister?” 

Betty leaned against her daughters shoulder, and Ash accepted the gesture by letting her head fall against her mothers. A tall brunette on screen was yelling at someone at a bar while the extras in the background pretended not to notice. 

“Krystal just told her. But she doesn’t know who yet.”

“I don’t know how you keep up with this storyline, Mom.” 

Betty laughed, and a little bit of tension released in Ash’s shoulders. “Your father never could either. It’s a gift, I guess.” She didn’t respond, and they watched quietly while the same woman poured her drink all over the man she’d been screaming at. 

“How are you feeling, sweetie?” Betty’s hand found Ash’s, and she clasped it tight. 

“I’m dealing. Worried about you, though.”

“Oh, Ashley. It’s not your job to be worried about me.” 

“No, but I am.” 

Betty sighed, and for a moment, Ash could see the woman she had grown up with breaking through just a little. “He was the greatest love of my life, you know. Aside from you and your brother.” 

“I know,” Ash said, soft. And she did. She had seen it, in the way they looked at each other, the way they talked, the way they kissed. Her parents had been love in its rawest form, pure like honeycomb, and just as sweet. “You were his, too, Mom.”

Betty exhaled and closed her eyes. “Until you came along, baby. I’m gonna take a little nap, and then I’ll get right to cleaning up this mess, okay?” Ash nodded, and then paused. 

“Mom?”

“Hmm?”

“Do you ever have any… Crazy dreams? Like where you see dad?” The image of Larry on the cross flashed through her head. “Or anything else weird?”

Sleepily, Betty felt around on the nightstand and picked up a prescription bottle. She shook out one of the pills and handed it to Ash, settling back into the pillows. “I used to. When we first moved here. But I went to a special doctor, and he gave me these. Now I don’t dream at all. He says that’s the way they like it.”

Ash cradled the pill in her palm. The capsule was clear and the insides looked almost herbal, like a vitamin. She had never heard of a vitamin that needed a prescription before, and then she realized what her mother had really said. “Who’s they?”

But Betty was already snoring softly next to her, and she wrote it off as the ramblings of a half-awake woman, tucking the pill in her back pocket and kissing her mother on the forehead. She wished she had something comforting to say, maybe to benefit them both, as she snuck out of the bedroom and back down the hall, the pill forgotten and Larry’s fingerprints still on her hips.


	9. NINE (pt. 1)

NINE

The next few days passed in a sort of hazy comfort. In the mornings, after Ben left for work, Ash and Jesse sat together on the couch, computers in their laps. While she answered emails and drafted designs, he fielded phone calls and teleconferenced with his bosses in New York. Every so often, she would feel his eyes on her, and when she looked up, he met her gaze with a soft smile. Sometimes his hand would find hers on the suede cushions and they would sacrifice the efficiency of two hands to enjoy the feeling of closeness.

On Tuesday, Ash convinced Betty to have lunch with them in the kitchen. She still hadn’t showered, and the perfume she’d doused herself in to make up for it was almost worse. Still, Ash was glad to see her mother out of bed, even greasy haired and in her bathrobe, and even happier still to watch her pop pearls of mozzarella into her mouth while Jesse talked about Wall Street and gelato shops in the city. 

Ash snuck away during the chatter to change the sheets in Betty’s room and throw away what she could, and when Betty excused herself, Ash brought her back upstairs to the smell of candles and fabric softener instead of mothballs. Betty settled into the bed, allowing Ash to pull the comforter over her waist, and leaned her head back against the pillow case, suddenly the image of an old woman on her death bed. Ash felt a twist in her chest, but Betty took her hand and it subsided. 

“He’s certainly a nice young man, Ash.” 

She nodded. He was. Usually. Betty watched her carefully for a moment, green eyes clouded by something Ash wouldn’t understand for a very long time. 

“It’s a shame you don’t love him.” 

On Wednesday, Ash noticed the bruise on her chest the seatbelt had left had faded to yellow. Curious, she’d lifted her shirt and checked for the imprint of Larry’s fingers on her hips. They were gone. Still, she could feel them there, burning through her skin. 

On Thursday, Jesse asked her to come home. It was the first time he had brought it up since arriving. She said no. He didn’t push it. 

On Friday, Betty allowed Ash to set her up in the living room so the latter could go through the bedroom closet. Ash had wanted to wait for Ben, but he had insisted, and Jesse had been locked in her room all morning screaming at an investment banker. So she was on her own. 

The bedroom itself was still worse for wear, but the closet was pristine. It was as though no one had touched it in months, and given Betty’s condition, Ash couldn’t really mark herself down as surprised. Her father’s signature scent clung to the air in the small space like fog, but she breathed it in as deep as she could. She realized she had already forgotten it. Fear ripped through her. What else would she forget? What else was lost to her already? Tenderly, she pulled a sweater from one of the hangers, a chunky grey knit, and buried her face in the pattern. 

She remembered a Christmas morning when he had worn it, sitting in the corner of the living room, while she and Ben had torn open presents with reckless abandon. She had gotten her first set of paint that year. Real paints, in foil tubes, not the little kid kind. She’d been so excited, she hadn’t wanted to open anything else. Aaron had let her paint the walls in the garage, an insurmountable canvas for such a small girl. Those paints had been everything to her. 

She folded the sweater and set it in the cardboard box she’d brought up from the basement. Privately, she scolded herself. If she clung to every article of clothing, she would never get this done. And the longer it took, the longer it would be before she could go home. Although, maybe that was why she held every pair of pleated pants, every old t-shirt, every novelty sweatshirt just a little too long before she put it in the donation box. And she really should cut herself a little slack; She had lost her dad, after all. 

When she had nearly finished folding, there was very little difference in the closet. Betty’s clothes took up nearly the entire thing, and the empty space where Aaron’s things had been filled quickly with a little shift of the remaining hangers. Well, she thought. At least one thing was back to normal. As she sifted through Betty’s things, making sure she’d gotten everything, something at the back of the closet caught her eye. It was matte black, maybe leather, and folded into a neat square. Whoever put it there had done so carefully, so it would be out of the way, but protected. She debated leaving it alone - She couldn’t remember Aaron ever wearing anything like it, which meant it was probably her mother’s, but curiosity got the better of her. 

Ash reached out for the object with the same intensity as someone disarming a bomb. It was leather, she realized, brushing her fingers over the surface. She pulled it forward and held it up by the shoulders. It took her a moment to realize what it was, and when she did, something in her chest imploded. Tears, hard and heavy, welled in her eyes faster than she had felt them coming, and when the jacket unfolded itself in front of her, her knees gave way and she collapsed against the closet floor, sobbing. 

She was glad for the absence of Jesse, (who had never seen her cry,) and Ben, (who had only seen it twice,) so that her shame at indulging her tears was lessened, though not absent. They hit the worn leather like bullets, and she turned the jacket over to look at the patch on the back. It was large, two hands tall and three wide, and well embroidered. A motorcycle, front facing and flames coming from either side, and around it, in traditional lettering, were the words “World’s Best Biker Dad.” 

Her motorcycle itself had been a gift from Aaron, despite all of Betty’s protests. He’d come home with it in the back of the truck the day after graduation. Ash, who had seen him coming from her bedroom window, had rushed out to meet him on the lawn, too excited to contain herself. She helped him get it down from the trailer, and even though he wouldn’t let her ride it until she went out and bought a helmet, she hooked her leg over the side and leaned against the chrome control panel until it left indents in her skin. 

And then he had gotten a box from the back seat, a plain white one like from a department store, and handed it to her. She hadn’t known what to expect - The bike itself had already been so much - And at first she tried to refuse it. But her father had thrust the box into her arms. 

“You can’t ride a motorcycle without the proper equipment.” His eyes had lit up when he’d said that, they way they do when someone relives a memory, like someone had said that to him once, too. She had to admit she’d been reluctant when she’d opened the box. The smell had hit her before she could actually see it, but when she realized it was a biker jacket, her resolve disappeared. It was beautiful, even before she put it on. Shiny, freshly oiled, with metallic hardware accents and collar that buttoned down. She was almost afraid to touch it. Aaron must have sensed this, because he reached in the box for her and held it up so she could slide her arms through the sleeves. It fit her like it had been made for her alone. 

There was one more surprise, however, and this one seemed to make her father the most excited. He extracted another jacket from the back seat, no box this time, and not as nice, but well-loved looked and massive. 

“Dad, that’ll never fit me.” 

“It’s not for you.” He’d turned it around to show her the patch; That big ugly motorcycle. And the words. ‘World’s Best Biker Dad.’ She remembered laughing, making him promise never to wear it out of the house. Her embarrassment had outweighed what should have been gratefulness that he was being supportive. It ended up becoming something of a joke between them, and he would whip it out on birthdays and grad parties and sometimes during summer barbeques, just to relish the look on her face when he did. 

But he wouldn’t wear it anymore. The realization washed over her, wave after wave of grief. For the first time, it had really hit her that he was gone. A little part of her, a part she’d done her best to drown out, was still expecting him to come back. To walk through the front door and envelope her in his arms and tell her that everything was alright. He was here now. He was okay. But he wouldn’t. Because this was real life, and when people died, they were dead, and that was that. 

Ash let herself cry until sound stopped coming out, and there were no more tears left in her to spill over. When she had exhausted herself, she stayed on the floor for a few more minutes, throat dry, gasping for air, the jacket clutched tight to her chest. She brought it with her when she found the courage to stand, hooking it over her arm while she splashed cold water on her face and prayed for the redness around her eyes to subside before she got to the bottom of the stairs. 

It must have, because when Betty heard her footsteps and called her in for tea, she didn’t mention anything unusual, except to ask if Ash needed another sleeping pill. In truth, she had forgotten about the one she’d been given earlier in the week, and shook her head. It was a good opportunity, however, to ask her mother if she’d remembered what she’d said about the unusual medication when she’d given it to Ash in the first place. 

Ash picked up the remote to turn down Days of Our Lives, draping the jacket over her lap, and turned her attention on her mother. “Mom, I need to ask you something.” Betty had already been reengrossed in the drama on screen, and only grunted. Ash assumed this meant she was listening. “The other day, when I said I was having weird dreams, and you gave me one of your pills, do you remember what you said to me?” Betty frowned, and glanced at Ash from the corner of her eye. 

“I’m sorry, sweetie. I’m afraid I can’t remember much of anything these days.” 

“You said when you and dad first moved here, you had weird dreams too. But you went to a special doctor, and he gave you those pills. And then you said you don’t dream anymore, because that’s the way _they_ like it. Do you remember that?” 

“I don’t, but if you say that’s the way it happened, I’m sure it was.” Betty’s attention turned back to the TV. Irritated, Ash clicked it off and tossed the remote onto the armchair across the room. “Ashley, I was watching that.” 

“Mom, please. This is important.” She tried to quell the bite in her voice. 

Betty sighed and folded her hands in her lap, annoyed, but turning her full attention on her daughter. “Alright, I’m listening.” 

“You said that was the way they liked it. Who’s they?” 

Betty thought hard for a moment, and Ash could see the wheels turning behind her eyes. After a moment, she exhaled, exasperated. “Honey, I can’t remember. I don’t know what I was talking about.” Ash pushed down a bubble of anger. She would have to talk to Ben about the other medications her mother was taking, clearly. 

“Okay.” Ash took a deep breath, leveled her voice. “Do you remember telling me that you went to a special doctor?” 

“Yes. Well, I mean, I remember going.” 

“Do you remember who it was?” Ash leaned forward, elbows on her knees. She hadn’t forgotten about the incident that had happened her junior year of high school, and she had gotten a familiar chill when Betty handed her that pill. She couldn’t place where she’d felt it before until now. 

“Oh no. Your dad used to take care of all that for me. Once I started taking them, they worked, so I never went back. Your dad would just pick up the prescription for me every so often.” 

Ash bit her lip. Maybe she was reading too much into things. Maybe they were just normal pills from a normal doctor, and she was fabricating a story so she could make an excuse to stay in Nockfell. Maybe she was the one who needed help. She leaned back against the couch cushions, sighing. 

“I do remember that Pastor Phelps was the one who referred us to the doctor though. He also suggested a fertility doctor when your father and I were trying to conceive. I’m sure he would remember.” She paused, and looked at her reflection in the tv set. “I think I’d like to go back to bed now, dear, if you’re finished in the closet.” 

“Oh. Yeah, of course, Mom.” 

Betty didn’t say anymore about the doctor while Ash helped her up the stairs and back into bed. Her mother settled into the blankets and reached for one of the yellow plastoc bottles on her bedside table. The label was worn and dirty, and Ash wondered if Ben would have to go for a refill soon. Maybe she should ask him not to. 

And then a thought struck her. The label. 

“Mom, which of these bottles is for the sleep meds you gave me?” 

Betty sat up a little straighter and messed with the bottles for a moment before picking one up and handing it to her. “Take it, sweetheart. You look like you could use a good rest.”

Ash turned the bottle over in her hand. There was no label, but on the bottom of the bottle she could make out three letters branded into the plastic. D.O.G. She clasped her hand around the bottle and clutched it to her chest. 

“Thanks, Mom. I think I will.”


	10. Nine Pt 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains descriptions of severe domestic abuse. If you or someone you know are experiencing these issues, please reach out to someone you trust or visit helpline.org for a list of available resources.

There’s something to the ritual of lighting some old shit on fire. 

Ash was in the kitchen, Aaron’s jacket hung carefully on the back of one of the dining chairs, elbow deep in the garbage disposal. Something had caught while she’d been washing dishes, because she hadn’t been paying attention, so she was haphazardly feeling around for it with a gloved hand, while she fixed her gaze on the fire pit in the backyard through the tiny kitchen window. 

She had some home for Christmas her junior year of college for the first time since she’d left. There had been a disconnect from Nockfell that her first three years away had allowed her to build up, and she’d been too afraid of shattering it to make the trip back for the holidays before then. She regretted it now, but at the time, lying about work and school had seemed the best course of action to take. And as it had turned out, she’d been right about the fragility of her resolve. 

She remembered her parents picking her up from the train station, Ben trailing behind them in an air of recognizably teenage indifference. There had been snow on the ground, the air crisp and clean, the kind of cold that burns your throat if you breathe too deeply. She had been so happy to see them, so suddenly herself, that she had forgotten about why she’d been afraid to come back until they got home. 

When she’d left for school, shed done it in such a hurry that she didn’t have the forthought to go through anything in her room. Walking into it then, with pictures of the Ghost Nabbers on the wall, Larry’s handwriting on the chalkboard, even some of his clothes still hanging in the closet, she felt a knife ripping through her chest. That night, under the cover of darkness, she had carried armfuls of his things to the yard and dumped it into the circle of brick. She’d watched it burn until only ashes were left, smoldering embers that looked so foreign against the backdrop of ice. Even when it was gone, she’d stayed, drawn to the place where it had been. She thought she’d feel better afterward; Cleansed. Renewed. Instead, she wanted it back. 

Her phone rang, making her jump, and she pulled her hand out of the disposal just as it whirred to life again, finally breaking through whatever had been stopping it in the first place. Heart racing, she pulled her cell from her back pocket and held it against her shoulder with her cheek while she tried to remove the dish gloves without touching any of the wet food remnants they’d collected in the drain. 

“Hello?” 

Sal’s voice came from the other end, a little distorted, the way someone on speaker phone sounds. “Hey, light of my life.” 

She smiled. “What’s up, Sally Face?”

“You busy tonight?” 

“Depends what you want me for.”   
He laughed, and Larry drifted a little further from her mind. “Travis wants us to go on a triple date.” Sal emphasized the word ‘triple’ in a sing-songy kind of way. He must not have been too thrilled about the prospect. 

“Jesse and I, you and Travis, and…?”

“Todd and Neil. They just got back from Vermont this morning.” 

Ash had missed them at the funeral. They were an obvious absence that she had hated more than she thought she would. “That would be amazing. I’ve been meaning to ask you about getting together anyway, I need to talk to you about something.” She glanced at the fire pit again, and then turned away from the window to lean against the countertop. 

“Sounds serious.” There was a shuffling on Sal’s end of the line, and when he spoke again it was directly into the receiver. “Everything okay?” 

“Maybe not.” Ash took a breath, attempting to string her words together before they came out of her mouth. What could she say that wouldn’t sound like it was coming from a place of paranoia? Or somewhere worse? Footsteps on the stairs echoed off the subway tile backsplash, and while Jesse always seemed to have the worst timing, just this once she was glad for it. “We’ll talk about it at dinner.” 

They were saying their goodbyes as Jesse entered the kitchen. His cheeks were pink and there was a spot on his lower lip that had been chewed raw. Whatever his morning business had contained obviously hadn’t gone over very well. He seemed suspicious of her quickness to hang up, and when she hurried to tell him that it had only been Sal, he made no effort to disguise the shadow that crossed his face. It was the same one she had seen in the mirror the morning she got on the train. It was the same one she had seen on his face so many many times before, always at the mention of other people who wanted her attention. 

People who might look for her if she went missing. 

“What did he want?” Jesse crossed the kitchen amd rummaged in the fridge, resurfacing with a beer bottle in his hand. 

“He wants to know if we want to go to dinner tonight with him and Travis.” Ash busied herself with pawing through the junk drawer, looking for the bottle opener. She reached across the island, where Jesse had settled, to hand it to him. Instead. he closed his hand over hers. She felt one of her fingers pressing hard into the sharpened groove. 

“Who else?” 

His eyes were boring holes in her head, but she wouldn’t meet them. She was watching a drop of blood carving a path down her palm under the place where he was holding her. 

“Todd and Neil.” 

There was a beat, and then he released her, taking the opener with him. She pulled her hand back to wipe it hastily on her jeans. The denim stung against the place where she’d been cut. 

They were quiet while he opened his beer, and after a moment she turned back the sink and made to finish with the chore she’d been at most of the morning. She had one plastic yellow glove stretched over her hand when he spoke again. 

“If there’s time to go have fun with your friends does that mean we’re done here?” 

Ash paused. She didn’t understand how she continued to let herself be blindsided by his behavior. Things had been going so well since the incident at the cemetery. Part of her had hoped it had been the start of a new chapter. Turns out she was only reading the same book, waiting for a different ending. She tried to keep her voice as level as possible when she answered. 

“There’s a lot left to do here, Jesse. I thought it would be a nice break. I think we could both use one.” 

In the beginning, she had gotten angry back. Never one to bow out of a fight, she had yelled and kicked and clawed just as much as he had. But it had only made things worse. And ultimately, he had more energy than she did. It wore her out, to stick up for herself. So she stopped. It was easier that way. Besides, if she was so unwilling to recognize her own self worth, maybe she deserved what he presented to her as the truth. 

“What exactly do you need a break from, Ashley?” There was an edge to his voice. “Please tell me what’s been so fucking pressing for you.” 

“Are you serious?” Ash turned back around to him, still wearing only one glove. She gripped the counter behind her, palm still stinging, using it as an anchor to keep her temper at bay. “My father _just_ died.”

“People die, Ash. I think you’ve put your life on hold long enough. I know I have.” 

“I didn’t ask you to come here. You can leave any time you want.” 

“And leave you alone?” Jesse laughed, but the sound was hollow. “I think we both know how that works out.” 

Ash took a deep breath, but heat was rising in her cheeks and even her best efforts to stay calm were doing very little. Still, she bit back the annoyance that threatened to show in her tone. 

“I told you, nothing happen-”

“Do not lie to me!” Jesse slammed the bottle against the island counter so hard that Ash could feel the ground shake under her feet. Breath caught in her throat, and it took her a moment to realize that when it had shattered in his hand, the glass had cut him. While hers had been no worse than a deep paper cut, it was clear that Jesse’s was severe. Blood was mixing with the amber liquid on the granite, a sickly looking witch’s potion. He didn’t seem to notice. 

She opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out. Jesse stepped around the counter island and slid between Ash and the other side of the counter, too small of a space for them to stand comfortably face to face. She could feel the rise and fall of his chest while he breathed, but it was too fast. Too wild. Still, he pressed closer. When she tried to look away, he gripped her chin and turned her face to him.

“I saw you, Ashley.” Every fiber of her being froze. “I watched while you put your tongue down his fucking throat.” 

He wasn’t yelling anymore. In fact, she could barely hear him, his voice was so low. It scared her more. There was something in his eyes she had never seen before, something deeper than the anger that usually lived there. Even when he was upset, she could always see the human in him, the soul inside the monster. Now there was nothing. Rage, maybe. Or hatred. She didn’t move. 

“Tell me again that nothing happened.” He tightened his grip on her jaw, fingers slick with blood pressed so hard against her skin she thought he might break through it. Fear must have surfaced in her eyes, because he twisted her head to get a better look at her. 

“Do you know how easy it would be for me to kill you?” 

He had said this before, but it had never occurred to her that it was something he might do until now. She had never heard him mean it before. For the second time today, tears threatened to fall. 

“Please, Jesse.” Her voice was strained. He still hadn’t let go of her face. “I love you.” 

Like a lightning bolt he had reached behind her with his free hand and pulled a knife from its place on the butchers block. At the same time, he pushed her head back so hard it touched her shoulders. She felt the chill of steel at the base of her throat. 

“I told you not to lie to me.”


	11. TEN - LARRY

He had made an ass out of himself. 

It wasn’t that unusual, but what surprised him was how bad he felt about it. Normally he could brush it off, just another mistake in a long, long, long line of them. But this time they gripped him like nettles, leaving him battered and bruised in their wake. 

At first, he tried to convince himself that it was because of Ben. In Spite of everything that had transpired between he and Ash, and Ben’s insistence that he would never forgive him for it, the two of them had formed an unlikely friendship. It was due in part to working in such close proximity; Larry had been the one to train Ben when he started at the Chop Shop in his senior year, after all. But mostly, Ben was easy to like. He was kind and warm, the type of person who eminanted goodness, even when he wasn’t trying. They had fallen into a sort of rhythm that made Larry’s day go a little faster, and although they’d never discussed it, they had a sort of pact not to talk about Ash. Larry liked that about him too. 

In fact, Ben had only brought her up on two  
occasions. The first was the first time they had lunch together, bent low over a desk in the back office of the garage. They’d been watching a football game on the tiny tv when Ben reached between them and turned it down. 

“You can never tell Ash we’re friends, okay?” Larry had looked up at him, but Ben’s eyes never left the screen. 

“Okay,” Larry answered. Ben turned the tv back up, and that was that. Besides, it had taken Larry long enough to not see her face every time he looked at him, so it wasn’t hard for him to agree to those terms. 

The other time had been the day before Ash came to town for the funeral. Ben had come into work that morning anyway, even though Larry knew he’d been at the hospital all night. It was easy to tell he hadn’t slept, but he went about business as usual. Larry had wondered if all the Campbell’s were so adamant about shutting out their feelings. He knew better than to ask.

He hadn’t bothered Ben with conversation at all that day, in fact, and was surprised when he went to hand him a socket wrench and Ben slid himself out from under the car they were working on, greasy and stern. 

“Ash is coming back tomorrow.” 

A thousand thoughts had gone through Larry’s head. He’d wanted to ask how she was, if she’d cried, how she’d sounded. Had she asked about him? Was she happy? None of those things would come out though, so he nodded. 

“I need you to promise me something, Larry.” Ben had never looked so serious. It was odd to see his usually soft features so hard and clouded. His voice too, was someone else's. Aaron’s, Larry had realized, but not until long after. 

“What’s up, man?”

“Don’t make her regret coming home.” 

He’d also tried to pin the bad feelings on Aaron, though that was even harder to do than placing blame on Ben. When things had started to get bad, like really bad, Betty took a turn for the worse. It left Ben burning the candle at both ends, going from work to the hospital to home and back again. He was picking up the pieces of his life everywhere he went, and Larry… Well, his heart broke for him. He wanted to help, in whatever way he could, so he and Ben made a deal; Three nights a week, Larry would go to the hospital and spend time with Mr. Campbell. He was a familiar face, because he and Ash had grown up together, and Ben would have a few nights to take care of his mom and catch up on chores around the house. 

Most of the time, Aaron hadn’t recognized him. He knew him just enough to chat, to be friendly, but Larry knew he was a stranger in those moments. Aaron was too, if he thought about it. Ash’s dad, the man who had helped them make mud pies, taught Larry how to change a tire, offered him his first sip  
of whiskey… He had gone behind a veil, a suffocating cloth that was harder and harder for him to break out of. Even when Larry could see him trying. 

Sometimes though, Aaron was happy to see him. On those nights, they would play chess. Larry would bring the newspaper so they could talk about the races or the baseball games. Aaron hardly ever ate; Whatever medication he was taking made him too ill, but when he did, he and Larry talked about how much he used to love cooking. Aaron once told him the best thing he could do for someone he loved was fill their home with the smell of a home cooked meal. Larry had held onto that, wisdom from a father so close to being his that it hurt. 

Larry had mixed feelings about those evenings, when Aaron was himself. They were good, of course. Hopeful. But they were also hard, because when Aaron remembered who Larry was, he remembered Ash, too. 

Larry had tried to avoid talking about her as best he could. He had become masterful of skirting around her name, thanks to years of practice with Sal, but Aaron wasn’t so easy to get off track. No matter what, he circled back to her, and eventually, Larry caved. 

He’d meant to be vague, truly. He said they didn’t talk anymore, and when Mr. Campbell asked why, he chalked it up to growing apart. A week later, Aaron had asked again. When Larry tried to give the same answer, he’d made a small sound in the back of his throat, like thunder rumbling from far away. Larry had raised an eyebrow, and Aaron, in a moment where he was purely the man he had been again, said, 

“Funny. I thought this time you might’ve told the truth.”

And so he had. In a way, it felt good to get it off his chest. He knew he could never tell the whole story, not by himself, but he unloaded more of it onto Aaron than he had anyone else. Because maybe he would forget. Or maybe he wouldn’t, and either way, Larry would be cleansed of his sins. He had to break the story up into parts, of course. Sometimes it was too much for Mr. Campbell. Sometimes it was too much for him. But when the whole thing was said and done, Larry and Aaron looked at each other for a long time. Larry hadn’t even realized he’d been crying until Aaron had reached for a handkerchief on his bedside table and handed it to him, gingerly, a butterfly ready to take wing. 

“Sometimes loving people means letting them do what’s best for themselves, even if it means what’s not best for us. Do you understand that, Larry?” 

“I do…” He’d taken the handkerchief, and after wiping his eyes, held it between his hands. There was a green heart embroidered in the corner, the exact same shade as Ash’s eyes. “I just wish it didn’t suck so much.” 

“It hurt her, too. Even if she didn’t show it.” Larry made to give the handkerchief back, but Aaron waved it away, saying, “Keep it. Someday, when she realizes what she’s lost, use it to wipe her tears away, okay? Just like I would have done. We all make mistakes. Even my daughter. But she needed to make them. Just like I did. Just like you do. But when she figures them out, and she comes home crying, remind her that she still has love here.” 

Larry had told them both, Aaron and Ben, that he would try, but the words had been hollow. Maybe not when he said them, not at first. But their meaning had shifted when he saw her at the station stepping out of the train car. She was as beautiful as she had ever been, tall and slender, bronzed the way she always was in summer. She had kept her hair short, but it was sleek now, instead of wild. She dressed well - Even though she wore jean shorts and a denim jacket over a tank, overall casual, they fit her better than anything she used to wear. It made it easier for him to notice that she was just a little too skinny; her collarbones were more prominent, and her face was a little drawn. Her eyes had been hidden behind an oversized pair of sunglasses, and under her arm was a designer duffle bag, a brand he didn’t know but had seen before, cream colored with maroon and black plaid.

It was the bag that got to him. Whatever it had cost, whatever department store she’d been perusing when she casually decided to pick it up, cut through him like a whip. He wondered if she had gotten it on a whim, or if she had saved up for it. Squandered pennies in the back of her dresser for months, the way he had for Lisa’s birthday present last year. That bag had eliminated any reprieve he’d felt at seeing her for the first time in so long, and every ounce of anger, all of his repressed fury, of all the pain of being nothing to her for the last six years surfaced so quickly it nearly knocked the wind out of him. He would have driven away, but she had already seen the car, and Ben would have torn him a new one if he found out. 

So instead, Larry had kept his mouth shut, all the way back to her house, until he felt he could say something- Anything- without screaming. Then he’d gone home. 

And drank.

He wished he could remember what exactly happened that night at the bar. He relived the night in flashes; He was on stage, and then the middle of a song he had written six years ago but never intended to sing was coming out of his mouth in shaky, angry notes. And then he was outside and they were yelling, her voice tearing through him and him trying so hard to remember the way she sounded, just in case that one moment, that split second of rage was all he would ever get from her again. 

And then she was gone. Sal had driven him home that night, and he threw up into a grocery bag while Maple rubbed his back in the back seat. They had been talking about him, but the conversation was lost. He didn’t remember getting into the apartment or falling asleep. And he had started again the next morning before a hangover could kick in. Before he could feel guilty for what he’d done. 

If he had been sober, he would have stayed away from the funeral. But Aaron was his friend too. The closest thing to a dad Larry had had since he was fourteen, and dammit he deserved to mourn. His compromise had been to wait until the service was over and everyone had gone. He would have a private funeral, just him and Mr. Campbell, the way it had always been at the end. And then he remembered that bag and gotten angry again, and found himself standing in the back of the church, drenched from walking there in the rain, listening to Ash’s speech with a flask in hand. He hadn’t seen it before, because of the sunglasses, but when she stoop at the pulpit, he noticed the light had gone out in her eyes. 

He knew she hadn’t gone when he approached her near the mausoleum. He had just waited until no one else was around. He wanted to look at her again, closer. No. He wanted her to look at him. He said whatever he could to keep her talking, so he could fill his senses with her, and then his body had moved on its own. It had followed a path he was ignoring, and God, when he kissed her…

When he kissed her, for the first time in years, he hated alcohol. He hated that the taste of her was marred by something so bitter and ugly and he tried to pull her closer, to kiss her harder, so he could drown it out. He wanted to remember how she smelled without gin twisting around her. He wanted to crash against her like waves on a shore but to stay. To live on her beach. To make a home in the place between her lips. 

She wouldn’t let him. And then _he_ came crawling out from behind her, ugly and unwanted. He had thought that maybe he could get her to fall in love with him again. Maybe if he could show her, because he was never very good with words, how much he still needed her, she would stay. She would fix him. They could be happy, together. He knew it. 

Jesse had ruined that. Jesse was why he was on the phone with Sal now, trying to worm his way out of dinner, so he wouldn’t have to risk causing a scene. 

“... Don’t even know you’re coming. I wasn’t actually going to even put you in this position until I talked to her, but something serious is going on, man. She sounded… Weird.” 

“Weirder than usual?” Larry’s head was bowed low over his sketchbook, fingers coated in graphite and grease. He pretended he couldn’t tell Sal was rolling his eyes on the other end of the line. 

“Don’t be a prick. You really fucked up the other night and you owe it to her to apologize, at least.” 

Larry scoffed. “For what?!” 

“Oh, I dunno. For embarrassing her in front of all those people? For upsetting her so much she threw up? For screaming at her in the parking lot? For acting like a drunken piece of shit?” 

“Ow.” 

Sal sighed. “Okay, I’m sorry. That was unnecessary. But so was the way you were behaving.” 

Larry flinched at the idea of what Sal might say if he knew about what had happened at the cemetery. He was always a poor sport about being right, and this time, he was more on the mark than he knew. Even so, Larry wasn’t convinced. 

“I don’t know, dude. Seeing her with him… I don’t know if I can handle it.” 

“I thought you were over her?” 

“I am!” Lie. “I just… Don’t need it rubbed in my face, you know? Like, okay. I’m over _her_ but I’m not over what happened. I’m not over how we left things.” Truth, at least a little. 

Sal was quiet for a minute. 

“I really think she needs our help, Lar. All of us. But if it’s too hard for you, I understand.” 

It was Larry’s turn to be quiet, so long that he heard Sal lift the phone from his face to check if they were still connected. Larry used his finger to shade the lower lash line of the sketch he’d been working on. Ash looked back up at him, smiling. 

“It won’t be.” Another lie. “I’ll see you tonight.” 


	12. Eleven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains mentions of blood.

_This is it._

The thought echoed in her head, drowning out everything else that might urge her to fight, to struggle. She was petrified with the idea, hands gripped so tight on the lip of the counter it could threaten to crumble.

_This is how I die._

It wasn’t as though she hadn’t pictured that moment, imagined it, just out of her reach. But for most of her life, she’d assumed she’d be alone. Maybe in her bathroom. Maybe in a street. Never under someone else’s thumb, though. Never at the hand of someone who said they loved her. 

Even so, part of her resolved to it. In the moments that passed with their eyes locked, Ash struggling to look at him because of the tilt of her head and Jesse begging her silently to make one wrong move, she had enough time to find her peace in it. How long had she been on the precipice? She was scared, surely, but maybe Jesse had always been a means to an end, a cruel kind of divine intervention. Her eyes flitted from his face, looming, to Aaron’s jacket on the back of the dining chair. What did she have left, anyway? Her mother was a stranger. Her fiance was a monster. Ben, the one thing that had always been holding her back, was strong enough to survive losing her. At least this way, she and her father could be together again. Reunited with the only person who'd seen her for who she really was. 

Well… Maybe not the _only_ one. 

“Look at me.” Jesse’s voice was sharper than the knife. He pressed harder on the blade and she felt the nick like a papercut, as the dull edge broke skin. Her eyes remained trained on the embroidered patch. It was a little faded, she noticed. One of the threads had come undone and left a thin strip of exposed leather. It didn’t matter though. It was perfect. Perfect, because it had been well loved. Like Aaron had been. Like she wished she could be. 

“Look at me!” Jesse said again, angrier now that he had to repeat himself. Ash did not move, even when she felt the path of a droplet begin where metal met skin. This time when she refused, he followed her gaze. His eyes connected with the jacket, and she felt the sudden absence of his grip on her chin. It wasn’t until he stepped away from her that she allowed herself to release a breath she hadn't known she’d been holding. He crossed to the chair so fast, by the time she understood what he was doing, he had already pulled the coat from the chair and held it out in front of him, like he would catch something from it if it were too close. Later, she would remember his face as being something akin to helpless, rather than angry. 

“God, Ashley.” She had never realized before how much she hated that name. How much she hated that _person._ Ashley, who had called her friends nothing in the parking lot of a bar she used to love; Ashley, who ran away from her problems and drowned them in Green Juice and vodka; Ashley, who was too afraid to walk away from someone who hurt her, because part of her was afraid she would bever be worthy of anything more. When Jesse said it, more like a curse than a name at all, she could see for the first time what Larry had been wary of when she left. 

“Even with a knife to your throat, you’re still putting someone else over me.” She hadn’t moved from her spot against the counter, a bruise forming where her back met the granite. They were watching each other carefully, calculating. Like lightning, Jesse lifted the knife and plunged it through the embroidered motorcycle, pulling down hard. For all it’s dullness, it tore through the fabric like water. The sound echoed in her head, intertwining with a scream that ripped from her throat of its own accord. 

Hands up, she lept toward him as he repeated the action. He twisted out of her way and stabbed through the leather again and again. Each time she yelped, like she was the one being impaled. She tried again to pull the jacket from his grasp, but he was too fast for her, and when she did manage to get a hold on a corner, he jerked it away so quickly that she fell forward after it. Defeated, she made no effort to stand. She watched instead from the floor, while Jesse tore the jacket to pieces, bits of her heart dropping away while he let shreds of fabric fall to the ground in front of her. 

When he was through, Jesse let the knife fall with the last of the coat, clanging against the tile. Ash could hear Betty calling for her from her bedroom, barely breaking through the static in her head, but for how long she'd been yelling Ash didn't know. Neither of them answered. He watched her, waiting for something, and then Jesse turned, picked his car keys up off the island, and left. She waited until she heard him pull out of the driveway to further against the floor, filtering fabric through her fingers like a stream. 

She had never wanted so badly to cry. Ash could feel the emotion at the base of her chest, the thick murkiness that accompanied tears, but they wouldn’t come. The sensation made a home in her instead, as she pulled the remnants of her father’s jacket into a circle around her, as though she could will it back together. 

This was how Ben found her, half an hour later, trying to match the puzzle pieces of the patch. She didn’t hear him come home, and when his boots stopped in front of her, coated in motor oil, she had a brief moment of panic that Jesse had returned. Instead, Ben lowered himself on a knee to meet her eye, pity etched across his face. 

Ash could only imagine what it looked like from his perspective. Beer on the island, sticky now that it had started to dry, dripping onto the floor where it had started to creep into the fringe of her leather circle. Glass everywhere. _Blood_ everywhere. On her face, where he’d held her chin; Across her throat, on her jeans, the island, the jacket. Ben’s eyes were too soft. Too much like their dad’s. He opened his mouth as if to speak - She wondered if he understood that she already knew everything he was going to say. 

But Ben, perhaps the best man she would ever know, didn’t say anything at all. Instead, he closed his mouth, helped her get up, and bent to collect the remnants of the jacket. He stacked them on the table in a funny little pile, and when they were all accounted for, he dampened a paper towel and wiped her face. 

She didn’t want to look at him. There was something shameful in the action of allowing him to care for her this way that she couldn’t truly explain. It was supposed to be her job to clean up the messes. To be strong. She was supposed to set an example, and what was this? Who was she to him now, so broken that she needed someone else to fix her? Maybe she was more like her mother than she thought; More emotionally unavailable. Just as sick. 

Still, she let him clear away the muck, and when her cheek was red from the friction of the cloth, she extended her hand and allowed him to dress that wound too. The only time she shied from his touch was when he moved to wipe at her throat. She recoiled, he lowered his hand. He still did not speak. Not while they swept up the glass, or mopped up the beer, or even when he wiped her bloody handprint from the countertop, the anchor she had been holding for dear life. Once during, their eyes met, and she felt the sudden need to reassure him, somehow. She could manage only a small sentence. 

“I’m okay.” 

Ben said, “Okay,” and went back to scrubbing. She would never be able to tell him how grateful she was for him in that moment. How much it meant to her that he hadn’t jumped down her throat and made her feel stupid, or threatened to hunt Jesse down. She wished she knew how he could tell that just being with her was enough. She was so ashamed that she had considered leaving him alone. 

Afterwards, with almost all evidence of her misfortune erased, Ben made them both a cup  
of coffee and they sat across from each other at the kitchen table, the same way they had almost a week ago when she first arrived. This time, she held her cup in her left hand. 

“Has it been going on a long time?” 

They had been so quiet for so long, she jumped a little when he spoke. He directed the question at his mug. 

“No,” she answered. The lie was sour, a lemon in her mouth. Two years? Not so long, she supposed, in the scheme of things. 

“Is it always this bad?” 

“No.” A half truth. Better than a whole lie. She added more sugar to her cup. 

“Are you still going to marry him?” 

She hadn’t been expecting that to be his next question. In fact, she wasn't sure she knew. Or maybe she did, and she was afraid of what it would mean to say outloud. She pushed back her chair without answering, excusing herself under the guise of preparing for her dinner plans, and went up to her room as quickly as she could without running. 

In the safety of those pale purple walls, she grounded herself. She changed into untainted clothes, smoothed down her hair in the mirror. She took a deep breath, and then another, until she felt less fuzzy around the edges. Briefly, she worried about explaining her injuries at dinner. Under Todd’s watchful eye, she knew she wouldn't be able to hide them. He was always the first to notice if she’d lost a few pounds or a few hours of sleep. They used to joke that the prescription on his glasses was just a little too strong; He could see what everyone else would miss.

The cut on her hand was as easy as dropping a knife while doing dishes. She had been doing so many lately, it was a lie even she might believe if she told it enough. But the obvious slice under her chin would be a little harder to cover up. She could remember getting a hickey growing up and claiming to have burnt herself with a curling iron, but she wasn't sure she could get away with that one anymore. And the slender line, red and raw, was so obviously a cut. From where she was sitting on the bed, she watched in the mirror while she ran a ginger finger over it. 

A thought struck her, and she jumped to her feet to rummage through the bottom drawer of her vanity. Everything else in her room had been perfectly preserved, there was nothing to suggest that the mess in her drawers wouldn't be the same. Sure enough, at the bottom back corner, she found a thin velvet choker with a little silver clasp. 

She had stopped wearing chokers after her first year of college. Even though they had once been a signature part of her look, they had started to feel childish and garish. She’d thrown away most of the ones she'd taken with her to school, but she remembered leaving one here. Just in case, she'd thought. Maybe one day she would want them again. Who would've known it would make such a saving grace?

Fumbling a little, she managed to secure the clasp. She had to clip it a little tighter than she used to, and wear it a little higher to cover her cut, but when she dropped her hands and took a moment to admire her reflection, she felt something stir under her ribcage. That necklace was one little piece of Ash, she realized. 

One small clue to who she used to be.


End file.
